All the drama around AI’s takeover of mathematics

This past year, OpenAI, Anthropic, and other labs have announced breakthroughs on numerous long-standing mathematical problems, in some cases pushing well beyond what researchers expected current systems to be capable of — including resolving one of the famous Millennium Prize problems. But in classic Silicon Valley style, AI labs are moving fast and breaking things, barreling through the discipline with all the grace of a runaway bulldozer. Results that might normally have been celebrated have instead sparked backlash. AI labs say they are learning from earlier mistakes. Whether those promise

Read on below for the latest updates in the AI takeover of mathematics.

Sep 28Robert HartOpenAI keeps bulldozing mathematiciansImage: The Verge, ShutterstockIn a chaotic few months, OpenAI has demonstrated it can do two things with remarkable consistency: make impressive breakthroughs in mathematics, then colossally screw up announcing them. OpenAI is now trying to do better. Somehow, it has botched that too.OpenAI’s latest attempt to repair fractured relations with a mathematical community it has repeatedly alienated is to consult a new independent advisory group of elite practitioners. But mathematicians speaking to The Verge, including one of the group’s member

OpenAI wants to consult elite mathematicians about how to not fumble again

After turning a string of spectacular mathematical results into a reputational crisis, OpenAI is consulting human mathematicians to help it figure out a less disastrous path forward.

Sep 12Robert HartOpenAI just wants to winImage: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty ImagesOpenAI has spent the last few years planting flags across the increasingly difficult terrain in mathematics. This week, it claimed one of its biggest prizes yet: a solution to a legendary Millennium Prize problem. In normal circumstances, this would have been celebrated as a historic achievement.Instead, many mathematicians have watched OpenAI’s relentless advance with growing unease. To them, the company appears less like an enthusiastic newcomer than an impossibly well-resourced interloper, charging into p

Another researcher is challenging OpenAI about the data driving its increasingly impressive array of mathematical discoveries. Just days after a bitter row erupted over whether the company’s models benefited from unpublished work, a second mathematician has come forward accusing the AI giant of unethical and “dishonest” behavior and a lack of transparency about the origins of its training data.

Sep 9Robert HartOpenAI’s sly mathematical breakthrough sends a chill through academiaOpen AI CEO Sam Altman speaks during the G20 Innovation Ministerial. (Photo by Matt RAMEY / AFP via Getty Images)OpenAI’s announcement Tuesday that it has solved one of mathematics’ legendary Millennium Prize problems should have been a moment of triumph. The result is both an undeniable achievement and a striking demonstration of just how rapidly AI is transforming mathematics. But before it was even formally announced, the breakthrough had been complicated by the unusual circumstances that prompted OpenAI to

OpenAI says it found a solution to a major math problem that has remained unsolved for around 90 years, as reported earlier by The New York Times and Wired. In a blog post on Tuesday, OpenAI announced that it discovered a solution to the Navier-Stokes problem — which relates to the flow of liquid and gas — using an internal AI model more powerful than the newly released GPT-6 Astra alongside 10,000 concurrent agents. The Navier-Stokes problem is one of seven Millennium Prize Problems, each of which comes with a $1 million reward for solving.

Aug 20Nilay PatelWelcome to the AI crisis in mathToday on Decoder, I’m talking with Robert Hart, The Verge’s London-based AI reporter, about what AI is doing to the field of mathematics and the existential crisis many lead mathematicians are having about it.OpenAI just published a set of solutions to longstanding problems in math that went off like a bombshell in the field. It caused a huge debate in the math community, and Rob spent some time talking to some of the most accomplished mathematicians of our time about it.Read Article >

Mathematician James Maynard has spent a lot of time this past year “soul searching.” A professor at the University of Oxford and winner of the prestigious Fields Medal, Maynard told The Verge he’s been grappling with the future of his field as the traditionally slow-moving discipline hurries to adapt to AI.

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