When did Math Get So Hard- Part 2

Click here for When did Math Get so Hard-Part 1, though it was not called Part 1 at the time. 

This post is not so much about WHEN math got so hard but an example of math BEING hard. The main issue is that so much is known that the PREREQUISITE knowledge can be overwhelming.

My interest in Hilbert's tenth problem (see here) and an email from Timothy Chow (reproduced in that article) lead me to the book

                               Rational Points on Varieties 

                                  by Bjorn Poonen

(see here for amazon link. Disclosure: Lance and I are amazon affiliates).

Here is the prerequisite for the book as stated in the preface: 

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A person interesting in reading this book should have the following background:

1) Algebraic Geometry (e.g. [Har77]: up to Chapter II, Section 8 as a minimum, but familiarity with later chapters is also needed at time)--- this is not needed so much in our Chapter 1. 

2) Algebraic Number Theory (e.g., [Cas67], Fro67] or [Lan94, Part One] or [Neu99 Chapters I and II).

3) Some Group Co-homology (e.g. [AW67] or [Mil13], Chaper 2]). 

[AW67] M.F. Atiyah and I.G. Macdonald. Introduction to Commutative  Algebra, Addison-Wesley, 1969

[Cas67] J.W.S Cassels. Global Fields, Algebraic Number Theory (Proc. Instructional  Conf, Brighton), 1965), 1967, 42-84

[Fro67] A. Frolich, Local Fields, Algebraic Number Theory ((Proc. Instructional Conf, Brighton, 1965), 1967, 1-41.

[Har77] Robin Hartshore, Algebraic Geometry, Springer-Verlag, 1977, Graduate Texts in Mathematics, No. 52

[Lan94] Serge Lang, Algebraic Number Theory, 2nd ed. Grad Texts in Mathematics, Springer-Verlag. , 1994.

[Mil13] J.S. Milne, Class field theory (v4.02), March 23, 2013. Available at here

[Neu99] Jurgen Neukirch. Algebraic Number Theory,  Fundamental Principles of Mathematical Sciences Vol 332. 1999.

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This seems like quite steep prerequisites. I don't have them so perhaps they are easier than they look. 

But in any case, Some parts of math are hard because, over time, so much math is known that builds on earlier math, that just getting through the background material is hard. Comp Sci hasn't been around as long, but its been around in the 20th and 21st century when more was being produces, so its also gotten hard, as I discussed here. Note also that computer science uses some of that hard math, and is also an inspiration for some hard math.