We’re not sure whether AI Alice has the capabilities required to definitively solve this open question.
Then, Biological Bob starts diligently working on this problem. He toils and toils, finding many dead ends but a few parts where he makes meaningful progress.
Eventually, Bob knows he’s made some real advances and thinks he might be getting close to the solution and word of this possibility leaks out.
At this point, we all agree that NS is still an open question and neither Alice nor Bob has solved it.
Now, we fork the universe in 3. In one, Bob continues his work and solves the open question (or doesn't).
In another, Carbon-based Charlie breaks into Bob’s lab, copies enough of Bob’s notes to understand Bob’s work, and provides the final insight to solve the open question. In this world, it’s fair to say that Charlie and Bob both contributed to solving the open question, but I think also fair to say that Charlie didn’t have the capability to solve it on his own.
In the third universe, AI Alice does something that you get to define that matches the pattern of facts we know and then we put it to the community to decide whether AI Alice has the capabilities to solve this specific open math problem and whether Bob’s contributions were required to Alice’s final step.
What do you define that she did? What’s the likely community vote on “Alice is capable of solving this specific open math question.” And for those who agree to that, to a follow-up question: “Alice is capable of solving a second open math question.”