What are the Complex Math Problems that Bitcoin miners solve?

Like everyone else, I was a little bit skeptical of Bitcoin until I learned that Bitcoin mining computers solve complex math problems to produce more bitcoin. "They've got computers that can do math now?" I said to myself. "Math is hard! Shut up and take my money!"

I asked my mining computer to tell me what kinds of problems they have to solve. The mining computer has a graphics card so it played a video of the latest complex math problem. I was shocked to find out that they were solving every high school sophomore's worst fear: Word Problems.

A train leaves Seg-Wit station at 8:00PM going 90 MPH (the conductor does not like to slow down through towns) to SHA-256 station, which is 4500 miles away. Another train leaves SHA-256 station at 11:00PM going 25 MPH (this conductor follows the law) to Seg-Wit station. At what time will the two trains pass each other?

Source

All of the mining computers' mouths were hanging open. They hadn't done this kind of math in so many years they didn't remember where to start. Some computers start drawing train tracks, others started trying some inverse cross multiplying, and some just doodled in their notebooks hoping not to be called on. But one computer saw that this was an odd problem and that the answer is in the back of the book. He raises his hand and says he has the answer. All of the other computers breath a sign of relief.

But then the teacher says, "Show me your Proof of Work."

The computer's face turns red and some of the computers silently chuckled. The computer had to walk to the front of the class and start writing out the solution on the chalk board (yes old school chalk). After working at the problem for about 3 hours (it was the low RAM class), the computer had filled the board with pictures of trains, time tables, and even brought up a class mate to perform a time-scaled charades simulation of the trains passing each other, complete with TOOT TOOT sounds.

Finally, the teacher gave up and said the computer had Proved it's Work and earned a token. Then she asked all of the other computers to confirm that the problem was solved correctly so they could earn their fee. The jock in the front of the room said it looked good. One by one all of the other computers said it was easier to just agree with everyone so they could just get on to the next block and hopefully it wouldn't be a word problem. Finally the word problem was confirmed.

All of the computers had confirmed the word problem, save one computer in the back of the room. He was the nerdy computer that had worked out the problem on paper and he was not amused with the the Choo Choo simulation. He stood up in a huff to bring his paper to the front of the room, but the jock tripped him and said, "Go Fork Yourself!"

Also see