>there are people who have spent their entire lives trying to describe and predict the primes to no avail
Seriously who the fuck even cares about primes? Why do universities keep funneling money to these autists for nothing.

>>16704754 (OP)
number theorists and cryptographers

https

>>16704782
nobody cares about prime numbers until they can't get a private limo for their sloppa without their credit card details getting sniped by pajeet

>>16704754 (OP)
we already know how to make primes so i dont understand what everyone is trying to figure out now

>>16704754 (OP)
>I have no idea how my online financial transactions are protected, but I'm sure it has nothing at all to do with prime numbers.

>>16706165
they are protected by guns, nukes, and so on

Not going to write you a sales pitch as for why mathematics research is important. Do you think mathematicians are rich?

>these autists

You are just an anti-intellectual. Why even inquire into scientific subjects? Probably much more entertaining things out there for you to focus on.

>>16706175
He is talking about encryption. How do nukes protect your data? Beyond encryption, number theory is simply worthwhile on its own merit. Money? A lot of theoretical mathematicians work with just a pen and paper. Paul Erdős was basically a homeless man, people would host him in their home.

>>16706189

>Why are people transfixed with the beauty and mystery of numbers?

>Why do people inquire into the unknown to uncover new knowledge?

Money? What money? Professors, prizes, math departments. That's about it.

The only money for mathematicians is for those who sell their soul to Wall Street as quants to gambles on stocks.

>>16706192

>The only money for mathematicians is for those who sell their soul to Wall Street as quants to gamble* on stocks.

Maybe that matters to you. When "autists" print unlimited money for you. Autism does not even exist in many nations.

It is not considered a real disease by the international medical community. Maybe you are just anti-intellectual. Anti-intellectualism and authoritarianism go hand in hand and the USA has had that problem lately.

>>16704781
>>16704783
>>16706165
Disingenuous fucking faggots. There is a difference between what OP is talking about (e.g. collatz conjecture) and what you are (e.g. mersenne primes). The former is about finding esoteric patterns in primes. The latter is about trivially constructing large primes that, when encrypted have a vanishingly small probability to randomly be cracked. There's no esoteric predictions about these primes that you're talking about. If there were, the entire encryption business would fall apart. The entire point of encryption is that you cannot predict what it is. Disingenuous fucking pseuds.