If math is more than proof, we need to better celebrate the rest of it
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Unofficial Hacker News client; not affiliated with Y Combinator.
If math is more than proof, we need to better celebrate the rest of it
Unofficial Hacker News client; not affiliated with Y Combinator.
jgord · · focus · HN ↗
Math that only resides in the weights of models, or arcane forms such as a long lean proof or even an unread textbook .. is not the math that we should be striving for.
Likewise all other technology [ and culture ].
LLMs and AI / AGI / ASI could lead to a new renaissance of math discussion and expansion of human math and science. Or the opposite, where we outsource all our thinking to the AI, and no new generation of artisans is trained by doing hard problems, and in a generation we have killed off human math.
Likewise all of the fields of human intellect. We need to make sure we protect future generations of doctors, biologists, software developers, architects, engineers, librarians, musicians, artists ...
A moratorium on AI development might be the only way to achieve this preservation of human culture.
svara · · focus · HN ↗
Tao is speaking of a very particular kind of mathematics, that done out of pure curiosity.
But maths, even at the highest levels, often finds applications sooner or later.
It will be economically impossible to justify boycotting correct mathematics that no humans understand on grounds only of purity.
This may happen very soon: one of the obvious applications of novel mathematical results is in building stronger AI models.
layer8 · · focus · HN ↗
Tao isn’t the article author, it’s a guest post.