Hacker News Reader

Comment by bamb008 | Hacker News Reader

The idea that OpenAI's proofs are fake is contradicted by the response of mathematicians. Were they fake, mathematicians would not consider this release important enough to comment upon[1,2], as vixra always provided a steady supply of such writings. Nor would they be able to write expositions and simplifications, of which several are published each day on arxiv (just search OpenAI on arxiv to find them).

But perhaps mathematicians are no longer able to be the best judge if a proof is valid. Yet nobody but them is able to even understand what is claimed to have been resolved.

It is really strange to see mathematicians of the highest rank taking these results seriously[3], holding lectures explaining them, yet see it dismissed here as a mass psychosis. [1]https://smf.emath.fr/actualites-smf/20-10-26-communique-sur-... [2]https://www.mathsoc.jp/publicity/news20261016.html [3]https://terrytao.wordpress.com/2026/10/19/a-sketch-of-the-pr...

View on HN

> But perhaps mathematicians are no longer able to be the best judge if a proof is valid

It seems they are still the best judge of whether a proof is useful or insightful though. AI is going to reward hack and try to eke out a win whatever it takes - which is fine if you regard these problems as trophies to be won, but not so fine if you take them in the spirit intended.

The famous problems that OpenAI (primarily) are trying to trophy-shoot with AI are famous because some human mathematician such as Erdos had the taste to judge them as fruitful grounds for new math to be developed in the pursuit.

Until we're at the point where AI is capable of things like creativity, curiosity and continual learning, AI will remain reliant on humans to fundamentally advance math and give it new tools to apply. For humans to do this it is helpful if they are inspired by the challenges set by their peers, which is why AI solving these human challenges is so counter productive - the snake is eating it's own tail.

> It seems they are still the best judge of whether a proof is useful or insightful though.

How can you be so sure of that? Like we know that human mathematicians can judge usefulness or insightfullnes. But we don't really know whether AI can do it even better. Like I don't think anyone has set up an evaluation of that.

> Were they fake, mathematicians would not consider this release important enough to comment upon[1,2], as vixra always provided a steady supply of such writings.

Few articles on vixra are made by companies with ~$1T valuations.

The truth is still tying it's shoes, in that metaphor.

Analysing all the proofs and finding contradictions or not takes time.

> But perhaps mathematicians are no longer able to be the best judge if a proof is valid.

Not the way they're written, and not at the rate they're dumped on the math community, at least.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com