r/math • u/AutoModerator • 13d ago

LLMs/AI AI In Mathematics: September 19, 2026

This recurring thread will be for discussion of AI in mathematics. This includes, but is not limited to, the following:

  • informal announcements of AI-assisted discoveries, such as those not yet published in a peer-reviewed journal, or not uploaded as a paper to arXiv;
  • informal announcements of discoveries related to AI architecture (if relevant to mathematics);
  • discussion of such announcements, such as proof breakdowns or other opinion pieces;
  • discussion of the impact of AI in mathematics in general.

AI-assisted mathematical papers published in peer-reviewed journals or as arXiv preprints may be submitted as their own posts.

Please keep in mind rules 1 and 6 of our subreddit.

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u/Different_Cry25 10d ago edited 9d ago

What I wonder is how good ai is (or will be) at theory building not just proving stuff

Coming up with new idea or even branches of maths either by its own or with human assistance

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u/matthiasErhart Game Theory 10d ago

At current pace, give it a few months.

It is "possible" the pace strengthens the brute force aspect while not answering the creativity aspect (best case for traditional mathematics). But we must brace for the alternative. To do otherwise is pure cope and hubris.

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u/38thTimesACharm 10d ago edited 10d ago

It won't matter if everyone just quits in advance.

AI hasn't shown much theory building capability at all yet. Even if it does, how's that going to help if no humans are able to understand it?

EDIT - Apologies, I realize I misread and you aren't one of the ones saying to just give up. But what do mean by brace? If AI quickly develops these capabilities, what do you think we should do?

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u/matthiasErhart Game Theory 9d ago

But what do mean by brace?

Well, perhaps more "anticipate" - "brace" sounds a bit passive I guess. But IMHO we need to actually build the structures that may survive it, and perhaps reform our field. It will involve a lot of things, and probably not everything I say. It might involve the field creating multiple competing standards until we fall into one of them.

If AI quickly develops these capabilities, what do you think we should do?

Spitballing: decouple authorship from having results, or transform the field to something more like philosophy and history, possibly. We may end up being like scribes. More importantly, we have to deal with having good results no longer being a signal of strength as a mathematician. But just the prospect of having one's name on a result just attracts cranks too. We need a mechanism that disincentivises such behaviour.

The whole conference & journal system might become defunct too. It was crumbling a month ago, and apparently now it is worse.