The most extreme promises'AI-assisted resolutions to some of the hardest problems in mathematics'may well turn out to be empty hype. But a number of AI-written solutions, albeit to far less lauded problems, have checked out. These were answers to a number of the Erdos Problems'more than 1,000 mathematical questions set forth by the Hungarian mathematician Paul Erdos'written with generative-AI models including ChatGPT. OpenAI quickly claimed a victory: 'GPT-5.2 Pro for solving another open Erdos problem,' OpenAI President Greg Brockman posted on X in January. 'Going to be a wild year for mathematical and scientific advancement!' (OpenAI and The Atlantic have a corporate partnership.) Much of the excitement around the news has stemmed from the adjudicator of these AI-written proofs: Terence Tao, a professor at UCLA who is widely considered to be the world's greatest living mathematician. His stamp of approval seemingly legitimizes the greatest promise of generative AI'to push the...
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