42 *IS* The answer to Life, the Universe and Zeta

Venusian Treen writes "In their search for patterns, mathematicians have uncovered unlikely connections between prime numbers and quantum physics. The gist is that energy levels in the nucleus of heavy atoms can tell us about the distribution of zeros in Riemann's zeta function - and hence where to find prime numbers. This article discusses this connection, and introduces two physisicts who tell us 'why the answer to life, the universe and the third moment of the Riemann zeta function should be 42.'"

Are with us or against us?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's the question and no, the answer is not 42.

Do you support our President's right to do everything in his power to protect us from further attacks like 9/11, or do you want to commit mass suicide with Jane Fonda and Fidel Castro, like the scumbag al Qaeda lover you are?

42

[Anonymous Coward]

I just hope I lose my virginity by the time I'm 42 ...

You mean

[stunt_penguin]

someone found the question? What was it?

Re:You mean

[ZombieRoboNinja]

The question, apparently, is "What is the third moment of the Riemann zeta function?"

I'm as surprised as you are.

How clever!

[Pedrito]

[Reimann] realized that the places where the zeta function outputs zero ... hold crucial information about the nature of the primes. Mathematicians call these significant places the zeros.

Man, those mathematicians are really clever at naming stuff. Next thing you know, they're going to call the places where the function outputs ones, "ones". Will it never end?

Ooh really funny.

[Anonymous Coward]

The ratio of funny to informative posts is ridiculous. Why aren't discussions on Slashdot informative; seems like half the replies are jokes that don't really further the conversation.

It makes sense

[jayhawk88]

I mean, "42" really being the answer could be considered infinitely improbable.

Re:The answer to everything is a Joke

[Kjella]

I sat at my desk, stared into the garden and thought '42 will do'

Well it was one of the input parameters, wasn't it? Only thing missing was if he'd drawn it from a sack of scrabble letters. Oh wait, you don't know... *nabs another bit of cheese* This Internet thing is great you know, never see who's at the other end. Well, that ape decendant that lives here should be home soon, guess I better go.

The Zeta function

[Anonymous Coward]

4, 8, 15, 16, and 23 are also significant. Hey, wait a minute......

Re:It's all in the interpetation

[Surt]

Yes, you're almost there ....
http://www.timecube.com/ [timecube.com]

Re:please shut up with this *42* crap

[toomz]

Indeed. Zeta? Call me when 42 is the answer to Alpha and Omega. Then I'll be impressed.

Don't trust statistics, then use QM

[Anonymous Coward]

Prior to this breakthrough, the evidence for a connection between quantum physics and the primes was based solely on interesting statistical comparisons. But mathematicians are very suspicious of statistics. We like things to be exact. Keating and Snaith had used physics to make a very precise prediction that left no room for the power of statistics to see patterns where there are none.

So of course they believe something from quantum mechanics which everyone knows has no relationship to statistics?

The Slashdot Conjecture

[sidles]

The Slashdot Conjecture: All mathematical and physics problems that arise naturally in everyday life are in complexity class NP-hard. The Slashdot Corollary: All meaningful discussion of these problems will require either oversimplification or humor.

Re:42

[Anonymous Coward]

You misspelled "by the time" (it should say "when"). The sad part is that in your case the answer IS 42.. by the power of two.. and the chick will be a hologram.. with a beard.

Regards,
John Titor

Re:Number Stuff

[Kiryat Malachi]

I dated a girl from Grand Rapids for a while... area code 616.

So yes, 616 *is* the number of the Beast. At least, once you add in 7 other digits.

Re:Are with us or against us?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's the best republican troll I've ever heard spawned from a discussion of the Riemann Zeta function.

Re:please shut up with this *42* crap

[x2A]

"Sigh. How much longer am I going to have to put up with this?"

42! hahahaha, you so asked for it :-p

Re:You mean

[Disavian]

First, you can never watch too much Star Trek...

That statement isn't entirely true. It's possible to watch too much Voyager.

Re:How clever!

[Sax Maniac]

Indeed. I once took a language theory class from a math bigot. He clearly hated computer science and (shudder) actual physical objects like computers.

Upon trying to describe a stack, he stumbled, paused and said: "Why do you computer people use such strange words like "push" and "pop"? Why not call it 'stick it on the end' and 'take it off the end?' It's so needlessly complicated".

Without a beat, he then writes a bunch of greek symbols on the board, epsilon prime-prime-underbar-hat, muttering on about nondeterministic finite automata and pumping lemmas.

Years ago, I learned never to take any computer science classes from anyone who held only degrees in math, but sadly I had no choice that semester.

That's nothing!

[dusterl]

13.37 * Pi = 42 Try to beat that!

Re:Are with us or against us?

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Either way leads to mass suicide- so let's go out spectacularly and nuke the mideast!

Re:242723920317613145364418177377134

[ceoyoyo]

Only applied mathematicians require scientific rigor. Pure mathematicians don't let the real world get them down so they require only logic.

Re:The answer to everything is a Joke

[ozbird]

The Tao begot one. One begot two. Two begot three.

Brother Maynard: [imdb.com] Skip a bit, Brother.

And three begot the ten thousand things.

Re:In more detail

[wickersty]

With no exaggeration of any kind, I have no idea what you just said.

Re:It's all in the interpetation

[sasdrtx]

Research shows that most numbers are really, really, really big.

Re:The answer to everything is a Joke

[Anonymous Coward]

The answer to this is very simple. It was a joke.

And thus scientology was born... oh wait that is a different thread.