It was discovered by the Great Internet Mersenne Prime Search (GIMPS), a distributed network of volunteers using their spare computer power to find the largest Mersenne primes. This system actually discovered the eight largest prime numbers known.
It warms my heart good to see that people are using their spare computing power to do something completely useless... I wish they would spare their processing power to assist more pressing matters including tedious work needed to understand the physics of the universe or deciphering genetic code fragments. Oh well... maybe I don't understand the potential worth of knowing incredibly large prime numbers...
- They were first studied because many of the properties of numbers are directly tied to their factorizations.
- They are used for a variety of encryption methods used to keep transactions safe and in CD and DVD protection.
- The search for Mersenne primes has proved useful in development of new algorithms, testing computer hardware, and interesting young students in math. I think the INTEL, Celeron and AMD are itersted in testing their processor.
- NASA scientists even decided that they are a good sign of intelligence and have included a short list of primes on the plaques sent out with the voyager spacecraft.
1) It's true what you are saying about numbers, but that still doesn't give a good reason to calculate such enormous numbers.
2) Encryption methods today, such as MD5 (using a lengthy password) and other one-way encryptions, would take countless years to complete, even with thousands and thousands of computers working on it. By the time the encryption is cracked, the information would be worth close to nothing.
3) In terms of testing processors, searching for prime numbers is a cool tool to measure speed. However, there are only a handful that are worth testing... for now. Once we have processors that can handle doing such computations, we should then approach the problem of finding the next few prime numbers. However, it's a waste of precious time to calculate them now when they are not needed.
4) I can't argue with that logic. They are also sending images depicting the anatomy of a male and a female. They should just dress them up in clothes with the symbol of the Target stores on them. Don't forget to include a small note saying "If you can read this, please take us over!"
you say its useless however its actually pretty neat i like the fact that technology has come so far as to know that. and no really if you put a 1 at the end it doesnt matter because 11 times 11 is 121 so therefore putting a 1 on the end doesnt really do too much. anywayz im in calc and thats something that i'd like to bring up to my teacher is just that fact that technology has come so far as to realize this...as for a computer making a mistake....for them to prove that something like that is true and to get the actual number they would have to have a really high powered computer and very advanced and im sure that it would have been tested many times over. so if someone has actually proved it and it was in an article...granted you cant trust everything now a days...but still if it was somwhere that u know is credible it was tested a lot of times to make sure that it is true. i still think that its really cool though thank you for the info!
Wow, i could completely agree with you. And its an unique of finding prime numbers beyond anyone could amangin.
it is still very surprising that computers are so limited in calculating something that seems so easy to define. Anyway what no. are we at now, and how fast is our progress? lol the progress of mankind in numbers
[quote=liauce,Jan 26 2006, 11:13 PM] it is still very surprising that computers are so limited in calculating something that seems so easy to define. Anyway what no. are we at now, and how fast is our progress? lol the progress of mankind in numbers
[/quote] it is still very surprising that computers are so limited in calculating something that seems so easy to define. Anyway what no. are we at now, and how fast is our progress? lol the progress of mankind in numbers
[/quote] Yes man define , suggest algoriths for solution , traslate this algorithms into programs and the computer execute it.
We are thinking to execute i.e find the solution or in our example the prime numbers of 10 million figures. Last year we couldnt dream about that before Pentium 4 3000 or more. Next year we can think about the prime of 100 million figure after more strong computer will be created.
Exactly as Nasa needs more speady craft toward planets in our solar system and in futureto planet of other system, we still need more powerful computers to solve other computing needs.
I ask people [not including you ] who don't contribute and not interested , I asked them to do favour to us and do not post just for posting and they have to initiate their interesting themes. Leave 7000 grazy and intelligent people to do their grazy works. This thread is not a poll to answer the question of to do or not to do.
Actually, its not completely useless. The defence governments would pay you a huggge amount of money on top of that $100,000 (although it would still be very handy on its own) if you just happened to find the next one. -better get to work- prime numbers are used to encode their top-secret goodies for some reason like they are not divisible by other numbers to make them safe or something or rather. If a new prime number got into the wrong hands it would end up with someone getting very angry, and the risk of their information being leaked. GIMPS now have a decent use...
wow, i still cant believe this thread is going on. IT was started in september of last year. THis is impressive for a post. IVe never seen a thread anywhere go on for this long.
As for the prime numbers, THey are used for government purposes. THere used as encryptions to hide things from other countries or hackers since most information from the government is stored on a computer. WHat i dont understand is how a number with like 10k numbersd can be used as a security reason
Well that wouldn't be a prime number haha. but nice try
A prime number has to be divisible only my 1 and itself
I bet my Mac could come up with that number in no time flat muahhaah
I seriously doubt that. The $100,000 reward does sound dimunitive in contrast to the over all cost that a computer with the capacity. It would take quite a load of processing power to come up with that many digits, especially since with each added 0, it would require more power than over the tenfold and as previously stated might take millions of dollars to build a computer that could handle such a work load without simply giving out. Even after the millions, the computer might give out anyway, therefor nullifying the chance of any profit and actually make the profit therein negative. Personally, I wouldn't go for it. If somebody would want to pursue this task for hobbyist reasons and had some extra money and time to spend for working on this, I'd say go for this. Prime numbers are interesting, though. Most likely, since their factor family can only consist of their own self and the number one. I personally think it could be used for security reasons, since that long of a number isn't going to be pulled out of anyone's hat any time soon. Quite a genius thing to use for encryption, in all actuality.
Actually, the largest known prime number is 2^230402457-1 containing 9,152,052 digits, found on December 15, 2005. For information concerning prime numbers and the research into in can be found at http://primes.utm.edu. All numbers that are submitted as a prime number must accompany proofs. You cannot just say 1 with 10 million zeroes + 1 is a prime. The number submitted will also be verified before being announced. An example of the output of a primality proving program (in this case, Proth) is as follows:
QUOTE
1557*2^231779 + 1 is prime! (a = 5) [69776 digits] 1557*2^231779 + 1 is prime! (verification : a = 7) [69776 digits] 1557*2^231779 + 1 doesn't divide any Fm. 1557*2^231779 + 1 doesn't divide any GF(3, m). 1557*2^231779 + 1 doesn't divide any GF(5, m). 1557*2^231779 + 1 doesn't divide any GF(6, m). 1557*2^231779 + 1 doesn't divide any GF(10, m). 1557*2^231779 + 1 doesn't divide any GF(12, m). 1557*2^231779 - 1 factor : 5 1557*2^231780 + 3 factor : 3 1557*2^231780 + 1 factor : 41 1557*2^231778 + 1 factor : 7
This is one I discovered but due to UTM server problems another person discovered it and got it submitted 7 days before I was able. So now, it's back to the drawingboard...
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Yes, the above is directly me from my own private research into prime numbers (one of my hobbies).
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