tea.mathoverflow.net - Discussion Feed (What number comes next in the sequence?)

Jason comments on "What number comes next in the sequence?" (12082)

2010-12-20T12:16:57-08:00

Daniel, thanks for the suggestion. I briefly looked at a preview of the book, and it sounds interesting.

Harry, thanks also.

Willie, thanks for the info. My other concern is the fact that votes to reopen are time sensitive, and they have already lapsed once.

WillieWong comments on "What number comes next in the sequence?" (12059)

2010-12-20T04:54:12-08:00

I was actually thinking of changing the phrasing of this question and starting a fresh post. My thinking is that there are a flood of comments that are no longer relevant to the new question, and they will bias people's thoughts.

Once you are done editing, and a few re-open votes build up, you can flag for moderator attention. The moderators can delete all the irrelevant comments (probably re-posting them to this thread here just for documentation).

Harry Gindi comments on "What number comes next in the sequence?" (12055)

2010-12-20T02:19:38-08:00

Dear Jason,

I remember reading about attempts at a mathematical formulation of Occam's Razor that seem like they might be relevant to what you're trying to do (see the links in the section titled Objective Razor). Please note that I am not qualified to crank-check any of it, so I would suggest that you take proper care.

Daniel Geisler comments on "What number comes next in the sequence?" (12054)

2010-12-20T02:18:28-08:00

Jason, you might want to check out Douglas Hofstadter's book Fluid Concepts and Creative Analogies which covers the issue of what number comes next in the sequence.

Jason comments on "What number comes next in the sequence?" (12052)

2010-12-20T01:25:48-08:00

Thanks Theo for the response and the vote to reopen. I was beginning to think this post was going to descend into the depths of meta unanswered.

I was actually thinking of changing the phrasing of this question and starting a fresh post. My thinking is that there are a flood of comments that are no longer relevant to the new question, and they will bias people's thoughts.

As for your concern in (2), my point is not so much that I think that these should be the conditions for correctness but rather that they seem to be the consensus for IQ test patterns. What I'm trying to do here is explore whether we can mathematically justify why such patterns should be the "correct" ones.

theojf comments on "What number comes next in the sequence?" (12039)

2010-12-19T20:28:14-08:00

(1) I'm no expert in questions of computability. (2) I have no love for Jason's particular choice of minimal conditions for correctness. (3) I have no objection to reopening the question. Moreover, I do want to encourage users whose questions are closed to edit and improve their questions.

Therefore I have cast a vote to reopen. But I could be wrong. See in particular (1) above.

Jason comments on "What number comes next in the sequence?" (11876)

2010-12-13T16:59:20-08:00

I tried to formalize my original question better, and I want to bring attention to it for the possibility of reopening:

http://mathoverflow.net/questions/49237/what-number-comes-next-in-the-sequence-closed

Thanks.

As an FYI, I'll be away from the computer for a few hours from the time of this post.

(Edit by Anton: changed title to title of the question and changed category.)