Teens Come up With Trigonometry Proof for Pythagorean Theorem, a Problem That Stumped math World for Centuries

CBS News ^ | August 31, 2025 | Bill Whitaker

[BobL]

Let me guess, they also beat Bobby Fischer in Chess.

[Secret Agent Man]

No one says black women can’t do it. Common sense of today’s society and general probabilities say don’t bet your life savings on it, unless they are an extraordinarily intelligent person.

[telescope115]

I’m someone who couldn’t get past high school algebra, and I think what they did is just incredible.

[Pikachu_Dad]

Why is this old story being recycled?

[PGR88]

For many high school students returning to class, it may seem like geometry and trigonometry were created by the Greeks as a form of torture.

And Isaac Newton invented calculus to torture college students.

[Bullish]

Jokes aside, calculus was ‘invented’ because it’s a highly necessary tool to solve many mathematical problems that we need to have lots of the really cool stuff we enjoy. The list of things we wouldn’t have is endless.

Yay, calculus!

[BobL]

I just think about the THOUSANDS of years of mathematicians...just have trouble that none of them got it.

[Hyman Roth]

Eff Calculus. I hated it. 😂

[Flaming Conservative]

Why is this old story being recycled?

---

Apparently just to irritate you.

[yesthatjallen]

"Why is this old story being recycled?"

Yes, I remember this story too.

[Ronaldus Magnus]

For many high school students returning to class, it may seem like geometry and trigonometry were created by the Greeks as a form of torture. So imagine our amazement when we heard two high school seniors had proved a mathematical puzzle that was thought to be impossible for two thousand years.

Haven't the lying morons at CBS learned to at least use a web search to verify their outrageous stories? According to Wikipedia:

"The theorem has been proved numerous times by many different methods – possibly the most for any mathematical theorem."

[dadgum]

Maths be raaaaaycist.
Being on time is raaaaaycist.
Truth is raaaaaaaycist.

Uh huh.

[nickcarraway]

This isn’t saying that!

[nickcarraway]

Bobby Fischer is dead - we can all beat him now.

[nickcarraway]

This was a new update.

[yesthatjallen]

Teens who solved 2,000-year-old math puzzle expand on their work in publication (2024)

There is no "2,000-year-old puzzle". No one bothered to look for a new solution because the old solution was elegantly perfect. Whatever they did was redundant.

[nickcarraway]

Leibniz invented it so. And parts of it were already invented in China, Egypt, the Middle East, and Greece.

[dadgum]

I know.

It was a satirical and sarcastic retort to the pinheads who claim such to be true.

[nickcarraway]

Could you beat them at Go?