# How hard is a hard problem?

- Institution: Gresham College
- Speaker: Professor Robin Wilson
- Year: 2005
- Level: For everyone
- Language: English
- Subjects: Mathematics, History
- Source: [Gresham College](https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/how-hard-hard-problem)
- Licence: [Educational use (Gresham College's terms)](https://www.gresham.ac.uk/terms-and-conditions)
- Who can watch: Teens profiles and older (sources give no ratings; placed by Invisible Network from the source's own words)

How can we distinguish between 'easy problems' and 'hard problems'? In this lecture I shall explain what is meant by an 'algorithm', and present some celebrated algorithms that can be used to solve a range of practical problems. I then investigate the efficiency of these algorithms and describe what is meant by a 'polynomial algorithm'. Finally, I shall explain the symbols P and NP, and pose ?the most important unsolved problem in current mathematics?: does P = NP?

## Lectures

1. [How hard is a hard problem?](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/learn/gresham/how-hard-hard-problem/34e8de4ee5c0) (YouTube)