fromwww.scientificamerican.com
1 week agoThis Is the Math at the Heart of Reality
In October 2024 Luke Durant, an independent researcher in San Jose, Calif., announced that he had discovered the largest known prime numberso enormous it would take years to write out in full. One might suspect only mathematicians would celebrate such a feat. But primes are often considered the building blocks of mathematics, and math itself is the scaffolding that supports everything from quantum theory and smartphone algorithms to the stability of bridges and even the odds at a casino.