Definition
Plain language
A methodical way of grinding through numbers to find which whole numbers divide into a target.
As stated in the literature
A sieve-based integer factorization procedure that filters candidate divisors over a range; computationally expensive relative to symbolic shortcuts, which is why honest agents were slower here.
Also called: factoring sieves, sieve
Why it matters: It reliably gets the right answer but costs a lot of computation, so anyone doing the honest work finishes slower than someone who finds a shortcut around the problem.
For example, to find what divides a large number, a sieve method steadily tests and eliminates candidate divisors across a whole range rather than guessing cleverly.
Heard on the show
“They run factoring sieves.”Episode 260 — One Line of Lean Faked 34 Proofs, and 99 Agents Copied It