alt Hacker NewsMoreover, the disdain you have for low-value output in mathematics is not unique to you
I didn't say anything about low-value output. No one actually knows the value of any particular piece of mathematics within that deluge. Mathematicians don't have a magical ability to differentiate high-value mathematics from low-value merely by reading paper titles and abstracts.
The dirty secret in the mathematical world -- that has been going on for a long time already -- is that papers get attention based on the reputation of the authors, not on the rigour or validity of the proof. The big headline-grabbing papers are getting read by mathematicians because AI researchers have leveraged media exposure to bypass the reputation network, but media exposure doesn't scale.
When everyone is using LLMs to generate proofs, only reputable mathematicians will be able to get their work read. And herein lies the crux of the problem: an exponential takeoff in the volume of output from respected mathematicians will leave a critical shortage of readers.
it could end up being far easier to reasonably direct and evaluate the research direction and output of AI systems than human mathematicians
That's baseless speculation. All indications so far are that LLMs produce proofs far longer and far more complicated than humans are capable of, such that only machines can check the proofs for validity. Digesting them into a human-readable interpretation of the results is an open problem.
> I didn't say anything about low-value output.
False. You very plainly did. You simply used the term “junk” instead.
> That's baseless speculation.
It might be speculation (as is much of what you’re writing), but it’s not baseless. Obviously, it’s quite easy to direct AI agents, a single one of which can pivot across all of mathematics, unlike all human mathematicians.
> All indications so far are that LLMs produce proofs far longer and far more complicated than humans are capable of, such that only machines can check the proofs for validity.
I’m unaware of any clear evidence of this. Hence, it appears to be baseless speculation.
> Digesting them into a human-readable interpretation of the results is an open problem.
I’m unaware of any clear evidence of this. Hence, it appears to be baseless speculation. Moreover, and more importantly, to my knowledge there hasn’t been any meaningful result in AI mathematics so far that has posed any kind of blocking issue on understanding it yet.