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To: wideminded
"Suppose that we rate mathematicians on the basis of pure talent on a scale from 0 to 100, Hardy gave himself a score of 25, Littlewood 30, Hilbert 80 and Ramanujan 100"

Funny, I don't see anything as groundbreaking as Thrmodynamic Laws, Kepler's Laws of Motion or the General Theory of Relativity .. so no, he's a genius but not inventing anything new.

Talented yes , original .... nothing as big as the others. Had he been educated in America or England, he would have been extraordinarily formidable.

60 posted on 09/28/2003 5:11:56 PM PDT by Centurion2000 (Islam : totalitarian political ideology / meme cloaked under the cover of religion)
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To: Centurion2000
Funny, I don't see anything as groundbreaking as Thrmodynamic Laws, Kepler's Laws of Motion or the General Theory of Relativity .. so no, he's a genius but not inventing anything new.

Talented yes , original .... nothing as big as the others. Had he been educated in America or England, he would have been extraordinarily formidable.

Mathematicians generally speaking don't invent things. They discover theorems. Sometimes these results don't find application in other sciences for a long time, even hundreds of years. Ramanujan was not a physicist so he would not be coming up with a physical theory like the examples you mention, which are all quite old. Ramanujan died in 1920 but some of his results are being used by physicists today. Ramanujan was "extraordinarily formidable" and he did discover new things that no one ever thought of before. When he came to England he was already respected by the top mathematicians there. Perhaps if he had received more training in England he would have done more or perhaps his unique talent would have been ruined.

Another problem is that most important "inventions" and physical theories can be explained in some way to the general public. But sometimes the most important mathematical discoveries are too abstract to be explained to the general public, many of whom have developed an aversion to even the simplest mathematics.

77 posted on 09/28/2003 6:48:19 PM PDT by wideminded
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