
Division by three (2006) - erostrate
http://arxiv.org/abs/math/0605779
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danbruc
Best diagrams in any mathematical paper ever. Previous discussion [1] from a
year or so ago.

[1]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7655487](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7655487)

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agumonkey
Brilliant use of napkin.js.

~~~
danbruc
For the curious, yes this is actually a thing [1].

[1]
[https://github.com/napkinjs/napkinjs](https://github.com/napkinjs/napkinjs)

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mathgenius
Don't miss the compelling sequal, "Division by four".

[http://arxiv.org/abs/1504.01402](http://arxiv.org/abs/1504.01402)

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gizmo686
This has probably one of the most amusing paragraphs of a math paper I have
seen:

"We made it hard for ourselves in order to show a method that works for all n.
It would have been more natural to take n = 3, which is the crucial test case
for division. If you can divide by 2, and hence by 4, there is no guarantee
that you can divide by 3; whereas if you can divide by 3, you can divide by
any n. This is not meant as a formal statement, it’s what you might call a
Thesis. We chose n = 4 instead of n = 3 because there are four suits in a
standard deck of cards, and because there is already a paper called ‘Division
by three’ [2], which this paper is meant to supersede."

Also worth noting, these two papers have the same lead author.

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mathgenius
"∗John Conway collaborated on the research reported here, and has been listed
as an author of this work since it was first distributed in 1994. But he has
never approved of this exposition, which he regards as full of ‘fluff’"

That's weird; I thought Conway was a big fan of fluff (and while the reader is
enjoying the fluff, he sneakily introduces the highly non-trivial.)

Edit: well the paper is fairly chatty, I guess that turns some people off (it
can obscure the argument.)

