[ExI] 2^57885161-1

spike spike66 at att.net
Sat Feb 9 23:43:05 UTC 2013


>... On Behalf Of Andrew Mckee
Subject: Re: [ExI] 2^57885161-1

On Fri, 08 Feb 2013 19:55:55 -0800, spike <spike66 at att.net> wrote:

> ....
>>... Alternately, a really smart and peaceful nearby alien species 
> intercept our signals and learn that we know 48 MPs, and decide that 
> we as a species are sufficiently intelligent to be interesting, so 
> they send us signals, share with us all the cool mathematics they have 
> discovered, and mathematics as a scientific discipline is greatly 
> advanced, consequently MPs are of great mathematical importance QED.
>
> spike


>...Clearly you have too much free time and alcohol on your hands.  :-)


Regards
_______________________________________________

Hey I resemble that comment!

{8^D

I must confess however, no such excuse will suffice.  I was sober as deacon
when I wrote that silliness.  Here's the real usefulness: the search for
Mersenne primes is a perfect example of human's love for playfulness.  If
you watch Mythbusters, you will see that much of science advances because of
our curiosity, which is actually closely related to our species'
characteristic dedication to play.  Our playful nature carries inventiveness
second only to war needs as a driver for inventiveness.  We are where we are
because we love play and we love competition.  GIMPS is set up as a
competition of sorts.  All of you can play prime search too.  Of course, I
will whoop your butts, but you can play.  (Come on, let's play!)

spike





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