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Why One of the World's Greatest Mathematicians Is on a ‘War Footing'
Terence Tao feels alienated from OpenAI as he shifts his focus to navigating the existential implications of AI-driven mathematical discovery.
What: Mathematician Terence Tao has suspended his collaboration with OpenAI, citing that the company treats mathematics primarily as a tool for model benchmarking. Tao maintains that mathematics is an infinite, creative human endeavor that is not adequately served by proprietary black-box development.
Why it matters: This highlights the growing friction between academic researchers and private AI labs, where the former prioritize long-term knowledge and the latter prioritize performance metrics.
Original article
Terence Tao, one of the world's greatest living mathematicians, is currently doing very little math. OpenAI's recent finding in the mathematical field has left him feeling used, as he previously had a good relationship with many employees at the company. Now, he sees them as only using math to evaluate their models, and can't see a way to constructively engage. Despite OpenAI's releases, most problems at the frontiers of math are unsolved, and as math remains infinite, the difficulty of problems is boundless.
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