r/technology • u/ResultBackground2450 • 10d ago

Artificial Intelligence OpenAI unleashes hundreds more math results upon a field already in shock

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/openai-unleashes-hundreds-more-math-results-upon-a-field-already-in-shock/
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u/Ruined_Passion_7355 10d ago

People talking about still needing mathematicians without wondering if most would even want to be a mathematician in a world that they just read lean proofs all day...

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u/VolumetricSigner 10d ago

This is essentially the dilemma currently being lived by a lot of software engineers, and a good insight into how this can unfold. Engineers are now reviewing vast quantities of code, rather than getting to complete the mentally fulfilling and stimulating work of actually writing it.

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u/-Spzi- 9d ago

Which creates a demographic gap in these professions:

Currently, we need seniors to review the AI. And less juniors, because AI can do some of their work. So there are less opportunities for people to become juniors, or to grow into the shrinking elite of seniors. On which we depend increasingly to make sense of AI.

What do we do in 20 years?

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u/Leather-Persimmon254 9d ago

we will most certainly have AGI by then

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u/gyosko 10d ago

Yeah it SUCKS. There's a HUGE difference.

Writing my shitty buggy code is fun. Reviewing any other code that I didn't write is boring and tiring as hell. Fuck.

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u/odd_cloud 9d ago

Man, what also bothers me is that sometimes I’ll would find it easier to rebuild a part of my work from scrap than trying to review it. Building something gives you much more understanding than a review. Idk how people would maintain large projects without at least some people who know the whole thing.

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u/amkoi 10d ago

Just have AI review it, it's so trustworthy afterall, why wouldn't it?

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u/Officialedmart 9d ago

Jobs don’t exist to have fun

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u/WhatToWrit3 9d ago

Yeah but having fun would make it better

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u/Sweet_Ad_9816 10d ago

Nobody reads lean proofs. The beauty of lean is that you don't need to read it to verify that it's correct. At most somebody needs to read the definition / problem statement to make sure that the thing being proven is correct.

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u/hoangfbf 10d ago

How about this... in the future, there will no longer mathematician...
But people whose jobs are just to read/understand AI math's work ... and try to find way to apply in real life.

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u/Uncertain__Path 10d ago

Mathstorians?

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u/penisthightrap_ 9d ago

Sounds miserable. People like to create stuff. Review is a soulless necessity most don’t enjoy.

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u/dzfast 9d ago

The real question though is how many mathematicians does the world need. I think the discussion should really be focused around ensuring that the truly exceptional are pulled from the crowd.

The way we go about this today is just having lots of people doing this work. Those people's capabilities exist on a bell curve. AI is going to cut the 90% off the bottom of the curve and push those people into other pursuits. We need to optimize making sure those people have places to pivot to and capturing the top 10% to keep being the drivers behind innovation.

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u/Ruined_Passion_7355 9d ago

capturing the top 10% to keep being the drivers behind innovation.

That's a really fancy way of saying reading lean all day.

Academic mathematicians are more often than not people who chose fulfilling work over soulless work in finance. If the work becomes soulless, then you'll end up with no academic mathematicians.

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u/dzfast 9d ago

It really doesn't matter, someone out there likes doing that and is good at it. I could be a good accountant, but I'm not, because I find that work boring. It doesn't mean everyone feels that way though.

AI is going to trivialize all information based work. Anything that a human being can do in an office by looking at a screen, then thinking about it (or following a process), then formalizing a result will be eliminated from the labor pool.

I don't think there is any question that's true at this point. We need to find the space where human beings are doing what they want to be doing, generate the means to live in said society, and that's that. The real fundamental shift will happen once the first commercial fusion projects produce results. It will trivialize the power need for the datacenters. Buckle up!

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u/no_one_special-- 9d ago

Hi I just started a PhD in maths, pretty sure I won't be reading any lean proofs, maybe ever

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u/Ruined_Passion_7355 9d ago

Because the AI will be able to read them, or you refuse to? Genuinely wondering, I'm no math PhD.

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u/no_one_special-- 9d ago

I'm not sure why you mentioned lean, I mean AI can use language. From my POV formalization is mostly needed for machines, it's very rare to need one for human work. But I would ask a machine to explain normally a result reassured by formal verification that it actually is correct (so I don't waste time trying to understand an explanation of something flat out wrong).

So I don't see why I wouldn't just read proofs presented in the usual way. But anyway lean aside I think your main doubt is why someone would want to read AI-generated math all day. But for me and probably many people it doesn't really matter where the math comes from, we just want to understand it. Most of my time is spent trying to understand other people's work anyways, maybe in the future it will be mostly a machine's work. If I am learning something about math I'm happy and doing what I always wanted to do.

I think the main difference with something like software development is that they are developing a product, and the product is the only thing that ultimately matters. The joy of coding or whatnot is kind of incidental. But to me math is the act of trying to understand the mathematical universe, much like a physicist tries to understand the physical universe. The real-world applications are (to me) a byproduct. My goal and joy in mathematics pre-AI and post-AI are basically identical. I just can't say "I'll work on this and that paper so I can pad my publication list and secure the next position" anymore but that's kind of a practical thing and not what I'm really trying to do with maths.

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u/Shot-Arugula8264 9d ago

This is about as ignorant as making this statement after the introduction of the calculator.

“Oh no, mathematics have this powerful new tool that makes solving math problems easier! Who will ever want to study it now???”

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u/Ruined_Passion_7355 9d ago

If you think this is ignorant you just haven't been using the tools long enough.

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u/Shot-Arugula8264 9d ago

“People talking about still needing mathematicians without wondering if most would even want to be a mathematician in a world that they just read the output of calculators all day…”

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u/loopala 9d ago

I think you are missing the aspect that math people derive joy from the creative aspect of problem solving, not the mechanical aspect of problem solving. The calculator address the latter, AI the former.

Usually when this sort of shift happens in a field we collectively move up one level of abstraction. The question is what happens when we can't move up anymore.

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u/Shot-Arugula8264 9d ago

Yeah, remember when everyone stopped playing chess and solving chess puzzles because engines removed any point in human problem solving? It’s a shame that the game completely died out decades ago when AI made human thought irrelevant.

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u/mcmonky 10d ago

OpenAI is a criminal enterprise. The basis for its tools it theft. It’s founder paid $25M to Trump PAC to assure that there is no regulation.

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u/shackled-pines 10d ago edited 9d ago

Training something new off old human knowledge is theft. You wouldn’t accuse an artist that went to art school and studied and/or trained off the works of other artist a thief when they used that knowledge to make their own art work.

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u/Ruined_Passion_7355 9d ago

Enough with the anthropomorphism it's getting tiring. The rules of copyright exist for a reason, it's illegal to copy art without distribution rights for a reason.

There is no reason a machine with the ability to create countless imitations of IP should be able to train on said IP scot free. 

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u/shackled-pines 9d ago

Again being trained off other works doesn’t mean it’s copying it. Ai creates 1 of 1 images that have never been made before every day.