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I have developed (or rather partially developed, if to be exact, as there are some unsolved conjectures and other white spots) a new abstract, fundamental, pure math theory.

I have published it as a freely available book (plus supplementary materials such as a partial draft of the second volume) in Internet.

I am wondered for very little attention the academic community provides for my work.

How many years (usually) does it take for a new math theory to become widely accepted in universities? Does it depend strongly on whether I advertise my work in scientific conferences?

I am myself not an official academic (but rather earn my living as a programmer). Also my spoken English is not yet good enough to participate in scientific conferences.

How many years it takes for a new math theory to become known in the world?

Would it be significantly faster if I were an official scientist (like a professor)?

ff524
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porton
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    As long as you refuse to make the effort to make the new theory accessible and also don't want to attempt to explain why it should be of interest to other mathematicians, nobody will ever care enough to take the time required to read that book. At a minimum you would need to start actually publishing stuff in the usual ways (such as arXiv). But even then I doubt people would pay much attention if you do not provide additional motivation. – Tobias Kildetoft Dec 25 '16 at 14:03
  • Why do you want it to take over the world? What's the benefit in that? What's wrong with the currently ruling king? – polfosol Dec 25 '16 at 14:20
  • Some comments by Dick Lipton on proving one's work: https://rjlipton.wordpress.com/2010/07/11/proving-a-proof-is-a-proof/ – Daniel R. Collins Dec 25 '16 at 14:42
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    Previously and previously and especially previously. To answer the title question: Nobody knows, because no mathematical theory has ever taken over the world. – JeffE Dec 25 '16 at 14:59
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    To answer the real question: How many years (usually) does it take for a new math theory to become widely accepted in universities? — Usually? Anywhere from five minutes to fifty years, depending on the scope and complexity of the theory. Homotopy type theory and Inter-universal Teichmüller theory are still struggling for wide recognition. – JeffE Dec 25 '16 at 15:05
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    I don't really understand what you mean by "a math theory" or "accepted". A theory is an experimentally falsifiable hypothesis; mathematics doesn't deal with those. Mathematics is "accepted" when it is believed to be true; that's basically all there is. If you mean "accepted" as in "agreed to be interesting by the mathematical community", we've already given you lots of advice about that in response to your earlier questions, and @TobiasKildetoft has given a short summary of that. – David Richerby Dec 25 '16 at 17:46

3 Answers3

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How many years it takes for a new math theory to take over the world?

It depends on a theory. Grisha Perelman has published his breakthrough papers proving the Poincaré Conjecture on arXiv preprint service in 2002 and 2003. They have been picked up by math community and several articles with detailed exposition appeared in 2005-2006.

So, why your mathematical theory has not conquered the world yet? Check a checklist below.

  • Is it important? Do people care about that type of problems? Have they tried to solve these abstract mathematical problems before? Are there any important applications of this pure math? How your discovery is going to improve the people's lives? You can increase the chances of your paper to be accepted if you answer these questions and publish these answers along with your results.
  • Is it new? You may think it is completely new, but the problem may be known under another name and be solved quite a while ago in some equivalent form, so you can not recognise it. That is why it is so important to discuss it with other colleagues who have a wide academic background and may help you to see the connections between what you do and what is already done elsewhere.
  • Is it correct? Unfortunately, not every piece of mathematical writing is correct. Professional mathematicians have little or no time to go through every manuscript appearing on the Internet. That is why we often rely on a reputation of researchers behind the breakthrough, or/and on a peer-review process of an esteemed academic journal. You are not an established academic and your discovery is not published in a peer-reviewed journal. It may really take a while before someone bothers to read it, if it ever happens.
  • Is it disseminated? It is not enough to put the paper online. Even journal papers do not have much attention these days, because of the exponentially growing number of written materials published and limited time to go through all of them. To increase the chances for your theory to get attention you should make an effort to publicise it on conferences, workshops, academic seminars, industrial meetings (if your theory may have an industrial application). These avenues allow you to tell people about your discovery, but also to listen to their feedback and hopefully to understand why they are not so interested yet.
Dmitry Savostyanov
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Dmitry makes good points, but let me add some things.

How many years (usually) does it take for a new math theory to become widely accepted in universities?

It depends both on how interesting it is and how easy it is to digest. If you mean accepted to be mathematically correct, this usually happens in the peer-reviewing process, so usually within 1-2 years. If you mean, gain a massive following, see below.

Does it depend strongly on whether I advertise my work in scientific conferences?

Not so much for correctness (usually), but for the next question yes.

How many years it takes for a new math theory to take the world?

On average, infinity. There are loads of new theories and, consequently, most of the cannot dominate the mathematical scene.

Would it be significantly faster if I were an official scientist (like a professor)?

Probably, just because most professors have more opportunity to advertise their work, and get other colleagues and students to do follow-up work.

Kimball
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My spoken English is not yet good enough to participate in scientific conferences.

My motto is Start somewhere! And that goes for daunting intellectual projects as well as cleaning up a big mess (such as my garage -- which you could think of as an overstuffed attic).

For you, the place to start is poster sessions / short talks and English classes. You should pursue these simultaneously.

Mathematics is best done with a combination of introspection and collaboration. The above two suggestions are the way to begin to break your isolation and begin to open up the doors to collaboration with other mathematicians.

Tip: when you begin to go to conferences:

  1. (a) If the conference has a poster session: Take a poster with you about some manageable chunk of the work you have done so far; put a stack of handouts next to your poster for people to take home. The handout should be just a few pages long, and should be presented in such a way as to pique the reader's interest.

    (b) If the conference does not have a poster session: Present a small module of your work in the short (20-minute) talk session (thanks to commenter Kimball for this suggestion). Again, bring some hand-outs to give to those who show interest.

  2. Look at some of the other posters. Notice what you like and don't like in a poster. Pick a few to study more in depth.

  3. Join dinner groups. Listen. Be a sponge. Share contact information with some people you feel some personal affinity with -- regardless of the exact branch of mathematics they are interested in. Networking is a gradual process and it takes patience to develop international relationships.

Bon voyage, and have fun!

Community
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aparente001
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    I don't think pure mathematics conferences have poster sessions, do they? – David Richerby Dec 25 '16 at 17:48
  • @DavidRicherby - Oh, shoot. I did applied math. I shared a building and therefore had friends in pure math. This is bad. How the heck are pure mathematicians supposed to get out of their caves and interact with others? – aparente001 Dec 25 '16 at 19:02
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    There's stuff outside the cave?!? ;-) – David Richerby Dec 25 '16 at 19:39
  • @DavidRicherby - Ha ha, but really, how? – aparente001 Dec 25 '16 at 20:00
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    Just because pure math tends to not have poster sessions, we do in fact interact at conferences. – Tobias Kildetoft Dec 25 '16 at 21:49
  • @TobiasKildetoft - Well, that's good to hear, but I don't know how to adjust my advice. Do you want to help? – aparente001 Dec 25 '16 at 22:58
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    @DavidRicherby look up FPSAC, a large annual pure math conference that does indeed have poster sessions. It's true that this is rather atypical though. – Dan Romik Dec 26 '16 at 06:50
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    Instead of poster sessions, there are many maths conferences with short talks (e.g., often 15min at AMS meetings). You don't need to have great English to give a 15min math talk. Also, just going to conferences and talking to people and possibly giving them your papers (so write papers not a book) can be quite helpful if one isn't comfortable giving talks. – Kimball Dec 26 '16 at 17:07
  • @Kimball - thanks, have incorporated this into the answer. – aparente001 Dec 26 '16 at 17:52
  • Sure, though I accidentally told you the wrong length of the AMS meeting talks---they're usually 20min, not 15. (I had to give a 15min talk at a different type of conference recently, so I guess that number was still stuck in my head.) But still, reasonable with limited English. – Kimball Dec 29 '16 at 01:15
  • @Kimball ... so now maybe you click the "Edit" button and fix it? (Collaboration?) – aparente001 Dec 29 '16 at 03:51
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    okay, done. I personally don't like editing other people's posts, except sometimes for grammar. For me, writing is very personal, and editing someone else's writing without being asked to seems rude. – Kimball Dec 29 '16 at 04:06
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    @Kimball - Thank you. My prize-winning (cough) writing style seems to have survived the editor attack in this case! – aparente001 Dec 29 '16 at 16:45
  • What are "poster sessions"? I currently don't have money to travel to a math conference (I live in Israel, here I tried to apply to give a talk at IMS meeting, but was rejected.) – porton Dec 29 '16 at 20:03
  • @porton Um, do you have access to google? I tried "poster session" math conference and the list of results looked encouraging. // It might be easier to get accepted for a short talk or a poster. // Well, saving up for travel to a conference might be a good project for you, concurrent with working on your English. I suggested you work on your English because it is very hard to convince others of the merit of your ideas without a confident command of the language you need to use for persuading them. // But what would the actual travel budget really be? I know someone who... – aparente001 Jan 02 '17 at 06:33
  • ... took a round trip flight, Israel to Germany, last year, and I believe it cost less than $300 (US). I think it was Turkish Airlines. – aparente001 Jan 02 '17 at 06:34