An attempt at tackling the intractable Collatz conjecture is a “noble failure” demonstrating the promise of automated reasoning techniques. The computer scientist Marijn Heule is always on the lookout ...

Experienced mathematicians warn up-and-comers to stay away from the Collatz conjecture. It’s a siren song, they say: Fall under its trance and you may never do meaningful work again. The Collatz ...

The Collatz conjecture is an unsolved conjecture in mathematics. It is named after Lothar Collatz, who first proposed it in 1937. The conjecture is also known as the 3n + 1 conjecture, as the Ulam ...

Some years ago, I wrote here about “hailstone numbers” (Follow that hailstone, 8 April 2016). These are numbers that are generated when you try your hand at the Collatz Conjecture—sometimes described ...

The Collatz conjecture is also known as the “3n + 1” problem. It’s an easy problem to explain and check, and has been tested up into the nineteen figure range. But it’s only now that anyone has come ...