I think this has an analog in software. The massive enterprise/ government systems which get bogged down for years and become almost impossible to replace.
Will be interesting to see if newer generations embrace collaboration and new technology more or will things still get pushed forward by the lone and difficult to understand outlier who becomes at least convincing enough for others to trawl through their complicated texts.
I guess issues of credit would have weighed into this method. In this case, if intermediate findings were published in a simple to understand way they may have attracted enough interest to be beaten to the final proof?
Will be interesting to see if newer generations embrace collaboration and new technology more or will things still get pushed forward by the lone and difficult to understand outlier who becomes at least convincing enough for others to trawl through their complicated texts.
I guess issues of credit would have weighed into this method. In this case, if intermediate findings were published in a simple to understand way they may have attracted enough interest to be beaten to the final proof?