Yet another Hacker News

20 points jacobedawson 4 hours ago 7 comments

sunir 1 hour ago | parent

People still play chess and go and StarCraft. People do what people want to do. It's not clear whether this will reduce the number of working mathematicians or increase it. There will a lot to learn from the machine proofs that will open up new frontiers as well.

So, it's like the story, "We'll see."

There has been a shocking but not altogether surprising development, and all reactions are valid.

dist-epoch 1 hour ago | parent

> People still play chess and go and StarCraft

but very few get paid to do that

lf88 56 minutes ago | parent

Chess and StarCraft are games. For many other intellectual activities, part of the satisfaction comes from contributing something meaningful to a collective effort. If a machine can do that orders of magnitude faster, for many people these activities become effectively pointless.

elicash 48 minutes ago | parent

This comment reminds me of the "run for fun" guy in Back to the Future Part III.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ouCVJIpSmEE

(This isn't to say I disagree with you.)

abnry 7 minutes ago | parent

The funny thing about people comparing mathematical research in the days of LLMs to playing chess in the days of Stockfish is that it identifies the competitive nature, and hence status seeking attitude, of the mathematical research community. Chess is, of course, a competitive game with a winner and a loser. You "win" mathematical research by solving a longstanding unsolved problem.

There is this idea of advancing human knowledge and adding to the record of what people know in mathematical research that breaks the analogy down, somewhat. But most people aren't Perelman. They would happily take the million dollar prize. And it is out of the question to do anything other than put your name on the published paper.

xanderlewis 39 minutes ago | parent

Have you not already heard others make this analogy a million times by now? It seems like I read it multiple times a day at this point.

Mathematics can be enjoyed recreationally as a puzzle like any other, but it isn’t just an arbitrary puzzle. It’s a science where one discovers truth and seeks an understanding of, and dreams up, new phenomena. It’s not chess, or go, or StarCraft. There’s no fixed rule set and the goal isn’t to ‘win’ or beat your opponents.

Let’s stop repeating this nonsense as if it’s a profound observation.

omoikane 29 minutes ago | parent

> People still play chess and go and StarCraft

Those are activities where repeating the same experience yourself is still enjoyable, kind of like you might eat today even though you already ate yesterday.

Finding mathematical proofs is probably more like seeing the ending to a mystery novel. Once the ending has been spoiled for you, it's really hard for you to enjoy it the same way, and it might be more fun to move on to a different mystery.