34 pointsby gsf_emergency_62 hours ago2 comments
  • degamadan hour ago
    Specifically, reverse math (a subset of metamathematics which looks at swapping axioms and theorems) allows us to show that some hard problems are equivalent to each other.

    EDIT: I think this line is the most telling:

    > But he cautioned that the reverse mathematics approach may be most useful for revealing new connections between theorems that researchers have already proved. "It doesn’t tell us much, as far as we can say, about the complexity of statements which we do not know how to prove."

    So, at this point, it helps us understand more about problems we already understand a little about, but nothing yet about new problems.

    • gsf_emergency_617 minutes ago
      That's par for a field whose name seems to have been inspired by "reverse-engineering", which by construction doesn't try to understand products that have not yet reached the market :)
  • Bankqan hour ago
    The approach reminds me of NP-Completeness (Computational harness vs mathematical-proving hardness). Am I over-simplifying?