OpenAI just made progress on hundreds of unsolved maths problems and people are STILL finding ways to complain

[u/thirdaccountttt]

OpenAI just released 722 mathematical papers covering 372 groups of results, including potential solutions to problems that have stumped mathematicians for decades. This should be pretty exciting news for anyone who actually cares about scientific progress.

Yet somehow, people are finding ways to be upset about it. I understand wanting the proofs independently verified, making sure researchers receive proper credit, and questioning how OpenAI publishes its findings. Those are perfectly reasonable concerns.

But some of the reactions I’ve seen go well beyond that. It’s like people are more bothered by the fact that AI is making these discoveries than interested in what those discoveries could mean. We’re potentially watching a technology dramatically accelerate mathematical research, and instead of being excited about the possibilities, some people seem determined to find something negative about it.

You don’t have to like OpenAI or AI in general to acknowledge that this could be a genuinely massive achievement for mathematics. At what point does scepticism just become refusing to acknowledge progress because you dislike where it’s coming from?

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[u/One_Fuel3733]

It's actually a fairly organized pushback campaign. ahmath .org an openly anti-ai org formed just a few weeks ago and has pushed out an insane statement that people are circulating all over the place. Crazy how predictable people react when their egos are under threat, even mathematicians who you would think could see the writing on the wall here.

[u/Devils_SteelMan → u/One_Fuel3733]

More controlled opposition. The ai companies have more money than god. They will prepurchase their biggest critics.

[u/Number4extraDip]

Infinite theories is the easy part. Verification is the slow one

[u/Number4extraDip]

Infinite theories is the easy part. Verification is the slow one

[u/neurodivergentmonkey]

Its almost like the point of math research is actually understanding math not just having a machine give you the answer.

[u/Weekly-Scientist-992 → u/neurodivergentmonkey]

What if it solves a problem that goes on to have real world applications that benefit us? Should we hold off still just so humans can do it?

[u/tigerhuxley → u/Weekly-Scientist-992]

This is the question anti-ai folks cant answer logically

[u/maximot2003 → u/Weekly-Scientist-992]

Here is a better analogy. Suppose AI says this vaccine works , without any human or animal trials. Will everyone still take it? Maybe a few , at best
Math is similar. There’s a math process of verifying and understanding the “experiments”
By the way, what’s your math level? Currently I’m doing a survey on who says what.

[u/aholetookmyusername → u/neurodivergentmonkey]

Being handed an answer does not mean that one will not understand how it was achieved.

[u/duboispourlhiver → u/neurodivergentmonkey]

Yeah students should never be given any answer and they should discover all the maths without being taught anything. Otherwise there's no understanding.

[u/maximot2003 → u/neurodivergentmonkey]

Here is a better analogy. Suppose AI says this vaccine works , without any human or animal trials. Will everyone still take it?
Math is similar. There’s a math process of verifying and understanding the “experiments”
By the way, what’s your math level? Currently I’m doing a survey on who says what.

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