350 year old Newton's Puzzle solved by a 16 year old

Ah, it seems that the media have gone into crazy hype mode. It's a very good job for someone of his age but it's an old result rather than something groundbreaking.
 
That's nothing I repaired a fault on an XP machine this morning without googling it.. that task bar is now firmly at the bottom of the screen.

Oh yeah.
 
Well done to him, at 16 he has had the confidence to do this and put it out there. He has also recognised that humility is very important when dealing with the media.

That said, he has also quite nicely shown that even the brightest minds benefit from being formally trained in the art of research. He has quite roundly shown the mistake that so many people make (including those inside academia) in that he has missed some pivotal published research effectively solving the same problem. That is not to detract at all from his achievement, he clearly has a massive talent for maths and should be absolutely encouraged to pursue a life of research if that's what he wants to do. As he lives outside of the UK he might even find it a career choice that makes sense!

The problem people like him have is that he'll find a lot of the set work needed to go through the system a it dull, as such there's always a chance he'll just not do it or drop out, which would be a big shame because he needs to jump through the hoops of lower education and get himself to a point where he can be mentored in the ways of sensible research in order that his ability can be harnessed by the research community as a whole.
 
wow that's not exactly a hard question... I thought about how to do it before reading the answer, now I doubt I'd be able to do the formula mind... but it's pretty obvious resistance, wind, mavity etc will all have an effect on the throw...
 
lsg1r said:
wow that's not exactly a hard question... I thought about how to do it before reading the answer, now I doubt I'd be able to do the formula mind... but it's pretty obvious resistance, wind, mavity etc will all have an effect on the throw...
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Doesn't your admittance that you doubt that you'd be able to do it suggest that it actually is quite hard?
 
Sheldon worked it out when he was seven years old but his mother wouldn't let him tell anyone. Instead she had him tested to see if he was crazy. The result was negative, btw.
 
lsg1r said:
wow that's not exactly a hard question... I thought about how to do it before reading the answer, now I doubt I'd be able to do the formula mind... but it's pretty obvious resistance, wind, mavity etc will all have an effect on the throw...
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The formulation is the hard part in fairness.

Many of us can solve physical problems in our mind, humans have a natural intuition for how the world around us works. Creating a provably correct set of rules that mathematically describes the problem is another matter all together.
 
manic_man said:
The formulation is the hard part in fairness.

Many of us can solve physical problems in our mind, humans have a natural intuition for how the world around us works. Creating a provably correct set of rules that mathematically describes the problem is another matter all together.
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This.
 
He didn't even win first place at the competition he submitted this project for
Ray's paper earned him 2nd prize behind Julius Kunze who took first prize with a study on Relativistic Raytracers "Lichtschnelle Perspektiven“ – Entwicklung eines relativistischen Raytracers"
 
His solutions mean that scientists can now calculate the flight path of a thrown ball and then predict how it will hit and bounce off a wall.
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You're honestly telling me that the top scientists in the world cannot predict how a ball will bounce of a wall?

Really? :confused:
 
Sefirosu said:
You're honestly telling me that the top scientists in the world cannot predict how a ball will bounce of a wall?

Really? :confused:
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Well now they can get an exact solution.

The amazing thing about the solution is that anyone who has done A-level Mechanics (I think up to M3 is enough) and Further Pure modules (FP1 has general differential equations right?) has the knowledge to get the answer as well.

Just requires that extra bit of genius to actually do it. I guess that's what separates him from most of us.
 
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