Timeline for Publicizing conjectures on MO
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
7 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mar 5, 2019 at 1:15 | comment | added | Zhi-Wei Sun | @user21820 I don't think it is easy to pose a nice and novel conjecture. Your "conjecture" that each $n>5$ with $n\equiv 5\pmod6$ is the sum of a prime and a positive square is not new. Hardy and Littlewood had a conjecture on $p+x^2$. | |
| Mar 4, 2019 at 12:40 | comment | added | Todd Trimble Mod | "Looks solvable" seems very much in the eye of the beholder, and it may very well be that Z-W Sun had the preamble about three triangular squares in order to suggest that maybe similar techniques apply. The same applies to the first criterion "feels like they have been studied before", although "is looking for a reference" does suggest a possible avenue to improving Z-W Sun's question. | |
| Mar 2, 2019 at 16:11 | comment | added | user21820 | I'd add one more point. It is easy to come up with conjectures based on probabilistic arguments and empirical evidence, but the criterion should be: why are they interesting? For the same reason, I don't really consider problems like Goldbach's conjecture to be interesting. To prove my point, I just made up a conjecture: Every $6k+5$ prime larger than $5$ is the sum of a prime and a positive square. | |
| Feb 20, 2019 at 10:13 | comment | added | Per Alexandersson | @LSpice I think maybe the conjectures in this case better belong to the already long list of conjectures on maths.nju.edu.cn/~zwsun | |
| Feb 19, 2019 at 17:07 | comment | added | LSpice | A bullet point that I might add in its stead, in elaboration of your first paragraph, is that the conjecture should not be part of an easily deformed family of similar conjectures. One can recognise this kind of 'bad' conjecture when a poster's question changes constantly in response to counterexamples. (I reference here not Zhi-Wei Sun, but other posts, of which I'm sure any of us can think of examples.) | |
| Feb 19, 2019 at 17:06 | comment | added | LSpice | Your fourth bullet point (about credit) seems a bit harsh to the linked poster, who seems to be a consistent MO participant in good faith and not just seeking credit. I wonder if it is really necessary to speculate on his (or her?) motives to give this answer. | |
| Feb 19, 2019 at 16:19 | history | answered | Per Alexandersson | CC BY-SA 4.0 |