User blog comment:Vel!/Yudkowsky on googology/@comment-74.105.183.206-20140322081702/@comment-25418284-20140322202748

"But that's where us cranks come in I suppose" I know you're being sarcastic here, but it should be clarified that cranks are very different from recreational mathematicians. A crank is an obnoxious and vocal person who stubbornly holds irrational beliefs. In scientific circles they are stubborn people who don't back up their claims with substantial evidence; in mathematical circles they are people who are just outright wrong and refuse to be convinced otherwise. (Like all the wackjobs who claim that they've overturned Cantor's theorem that a set is always outnumbered by its power set.)