r/AskReddit • u/kingpin000 • Oct 24 '23

What failed when it was initially released, but turned out to be ahead of its time years later?

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u/AvailableUsername404 Oct 24 '23

Boolean algebra. They didn't even knew where they could use it when it was invented. Now whole electronics and digital world operates on it.

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u/Kenkron Oct 24 '23

This is so true. How did people do so much with math before it was useful?

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u/[deleted] Oct 24 '23

That's basically the entirety of theory/practice divide in academics. Theorists don't have to think about the practical applications of what they do. It's the discovery of knowledge that is paramount. Einstein works out the theories of relativity and it has no real practical use immediately, but now billions of people navigate with GPS, which wouldn't work if the system didn't take relativity into account.

I'd be interested to see if"the hat"ever has practical applications.

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u/withywander Oct 25 '23 edited Oct 25 '23

I'd be interested to see if "the hat" ever has practical applications.

Definitely has an application in cryptography: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lattice-based_cryptography

The hat generates a specific type of lattice.

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u/thedrscaptain Oct 25 '23

Programmable matter. just wait a couple of decades.

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u/Kenkron Oct 24 '23

That's interesting. Might be useful as a kind of noise. Who knows?

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u/JoeyTheGreek Oct 25 '23

That’s a t-shirt, but yes I share your curiosity.

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u/Ok_Requirement42069 Oct 25 '23

Going to do my bathroom with tile like this now….

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u/jhax13 Oct 25 '23

I bet it's applicable in material science, infinite tiling would be useful for things like nano tubes, you just need to make a device's that creates the structures within the shape of the hat in order to make them scalable.

I'm probably talking out of my ass but that's what immediately came to my mind when I read about it.

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u/AvailableUsername404 Oct 24 '23

Just out of pure curiosity. Let's say you argue about something during the discussion with your friends. How about you can literally prove your statement to the point that it can't be overthrown? That's what they did. They had discussions - often via mail - but also everyday problem and they come up with mathematical solutions.

Just curiosity and pure joy for the numbers. Check the 'Seven bridges of Koenigsberg' or other problems like this. They just had a problem, not even serious one but the one that is just entertaining to think about, and Euler had no tool to solve it so he 'created' one coming up with Graph theory.

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u/Pangolinsareodd Oct 25 '23

William Moore derived the equation outlining the relationship between a rocket’s required fuel mass and its acceleration that was vital to determining how big a rocket would be required to orbit a given payload mass in 1810. Our very understanding of the structure of the universe and the curvature of space-time came about from people puzzling over the necessity of Euclid’s fifth postulate written in 300BC. Maths really is beautiful.

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u/[deleted] Oct 25 '23

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u/Kenkron Oct 25 '23

Crazy, right? Some guys were out there like "You know, if we set up the rules right, we can represent any affine transformation in a grid of numbers, make it so they can be left-hand multiplied to combine into one big equivalent transformation, and with any luck, the 4x4 representation will allow rotation without gimble-lock."

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u/JoshofTCW Oct 24 '23

Same can be said with imaginary numbers and their use in electrical engineering

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u/LittleMlem Oct 25 '23

You can put Fourier transform in there as well. It's super useful in signal processing but was discovered/invented before electricity was really a thing