The interesting thing is that they are working with simple 1st grade math problems using very creative problem solving. I wish I'd seen math like this when I was younger. I might not have hated it so much.

Less hand wavy explanation at TRF. What is going on is that a growing part of the series is canceled (for physical reasons) leaving behind -1/12.

And a more "philosophical" explanation at TRF here.

It must be why so many people wanted a base 12 numeric system instead of the base ten.

(We already have 12/24 hours/12 months etc)

If you want to learn more about base 12 (dozenal/duodecimal) click my name for a youtube video.

That made everyone better dressed, richer and more handsome.

So the sum of all natural numbers is a rational number. By any chance is the sum of all rational numbers also -1/12? The sum of all irrational numbers? (Not trolling; I'm mathematically challenged.)

That just proves that my aversion to higher math was and is totally justified. Once you get to the square root of minus one it's obviously bullshit all the way down no matter how useful it may be.

It's the Judas Principle. He was the negative one out of the twelve.

*sigh* If it's not just a joke, a send-up, then they are dim-witted boobs. Never let physicists try to do a mathematician's job.

I first thought it was a hoax, then I saw that there is a lot of support for it, so it might be a very widespread hoax. The problem isn't that the result is counter-intuitive but that it is illogical. You cannot add ever larger numbers to a sum and get a smaller result without changing the definitions of "add" or "sum" or "larger". So, it seems that this is the essence of "mathematical hocus pocus". Something is hidden here.

Lewis Carroll demonstrated that 2+2=5 but he divided by zero to make it so. Perhaps something like that is happening here. Mathematical "sleight of hand".

Or, like the non-Euclidians showed that parallel lines do intersect, but they have to warp the plane to make it so, maybe the zeta function changes the meaning of numbers.

I am probably showing my ignorance here. Somebody teach me!

I first thought it was a hoax, then I saw that there is a lot of support for it, so it might be a very widespread hoax. The problem isn't that the result is counter-intuitive but that it is illogical. You cannot add ever larger numbers to a sum and get a smaller result without changing the definitions of "add" or "sum" or "larger". So, it seems that this is the essence of "mathematical hocus pocus". Something is hidden here.

Lewis Carroll demonstrated that 2+2=5 but he divided by zero to make it so. Perhaps something like that is happening here. Mathematical "sleight of hand".

Or, like the non-Euclidians showed that parallel lines do intersect, but they have to warp the plane to make it so, maybe the zeta function changes the meaning of numbers.

I am probably showing my ignorance here. Somebody teach me!

OK, my initial reaction seems to be the right one. The first sum of alternating zeros and ones does not converge so its result is NOT 1/2. And there seems to be a problem of adding a coverging series with diverging ones. It is inconsistent.

Here are a couple of links:

http://scientopia.org/blogs/goodmath/2014/01/17/bad-math-from-the-bad-astronomer/

and a simplier synopsis:

http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2014/01/17/the-sum-of-all-natural-numbers-is-not-112/

I guess the bottom line is that you can't add ever larger numbers and get a smaller result. It isn't just bad math, it is bad logic.

BroKen,

Yeah, that's my first thought. The initial postulate is where I have a problem. Is infinity even or odd and does that question even make sense? Taking an "average" of the even/odd results seems to me where the mistake actually is.

but I'm not a mathematician.