Without physics, mathematics would indeed be a discipline devoid of any real-world significance.
But precisely because we have time, space, length, weight, speed, volume, and so on, these physical concepts, mathematics becomes important.
The meaningful essence belongs to this world because it is made of matter, and exploring the mysteries of this world is inseparable from mathematics.
From Newton's First Law to Einstein's general theory of relativity, the interpretation of physical aspects needs to be expressed in mathematical equations.
Taylor's Theorem is an important mathematical tool often used in studying the properties of complex functions, and engineers need to learn Taylor's expansion to design and optimize mechanical systems. Experienced engineers don't even need to memorize those complex formulas by rote— they can derive the necessary expansions simply by taking up pen and paper.
Structures in mathematics often have physical significance.
The slow development of mathematics at this stage is not only because the predecessors were too powerful, but also because they have mostly summarized the easily describable physical world already.
Newton essentially figured out the laws of motion for macroscopic objects.
Einstein explored the laws of motion on the cosmic level.
Fourier dealt with heat transfer, signal analysis, wave functions, and so on.
The Schrödinger wave equation began to let people understand the distribution laws of particles in the quantum world...
To Peter Schultz and Edward Whitten, it seemed that Qiao Ze, standing on the shoulders of giants, wanted to go even further, unifying all these complex physical laws. To put it more plainly, they believed Qiao Ze was trying to find a common mathematical structure between the microscopic and macroscopic scales to explain all interactions.
Because Qiao Ze had already innovatively incorporated gravity and a special field into a high-dimensional geometrical structure.
Should he manage to make a coherent argument, there was no doubt that the academic world's understanding of the physical world would be elevated significantly.
After all, this had been the pursuit of several generations in the Western academic community.
So the two people in the office quietened down again, each with their own thoughts.
It wasn't until a few minutes later that Peter Schultz put down Edward's manuscript, rubbed his face hard with both hands, and said, "Well, I think that at the last conference, Qiao didn't show all his research findings. It's hard to imagine what else he's hiding."
Still hiding results?
Edward Whitten didn't know what the real situation was.
But clearly, the explanation given by Peter Schultz was more plausible.
After all, it had only been about a month since the last conference; it was difficult to imagine that in such a short time, someone could find a brand new research direction in geometry.
Einstein took over a decade to move from special relativity to general relativity, and the latter had the help of a whole bunch of top-level mathematicians of the time, including but not limited to Grossman and Hilbert...
Qiao Ze was a lone wolf in the theoretical realm.
So far, his published papers were not only authored by a small group, but even the acknowledgments were rare.
Let alone his near absence from mathematicians' activities.
Even at conferences held right at his doorstep, he only showed up on the day of the event—if you arrived early hoping to meet him, you wouldn't succeed.
Is this really a person?
But on the other hand, humanity's civilization has always been pushed forward by that one in a billion genius generation after generation.
How could normal people possibly glimpse the truth of the world from those tangled clues?
Or even predict phenomena fundamentally unobservable in the macroscopic or microscopic worlds?
Moreover, if we're honest, the academic development this century has nearly ground to a halt. Modern so-called technological developments almost entirely rely on theories from decades ago; indeed, it was time to take a step forward.
"Regardless, this is at least a good thing," Edward Whitten said with a nod.
There was nothing to argue about on this topic.
Whether Qiao Ze figured it out this month or had the theory well before, didn't really matter.
What bothered Edward was that Qiao Ze had no intention of spreading these theories.
At least not for now.
Because the guy had only released two problems to the entire network.
What was he trying to do?
Did solving the problems grant one the qualification to join?
For years, Edward Whitten hadn't wished for a scholar's manuscript as much as he did today, even if it meant stealing it... because it currently seemed like the only way to get enough information to study a completely new academic direction.
Before he could express his regret, Peter Schultz spoke up, voicing his thoughts, "Alright, I admit I'm beginning to have regrets. Edward, maybe when Qiao made his request that day, we should have just agreed."
"Even if it meant staying in Huaxia?" Edward Whitten asked.
"Oh...that shouldn't be necessary, right? We could contact him through email. By the way, has Qiao replied to your emails these days?"
"If you mean an automatic reply, then yes."
Peter Schultz fell silent.
Because he knew the content of the automatic reply—Currently, I have other research tasks and will not be discussing the Super Helical Space Algebra in depth.
"But he issued two problems on the internet today, don't you think this might mean he has changed his mind?" Peter Schultz said.