What should OpenAI have done instead of what they did? I think it’s far better that we get the messy dump of proofs ASAP so everyone can grapple with the reality of what these models can and can’t do, and participate in figuring out where things go from here.
What would a more “responsible” approach have been?
For each paper they think they have, reach out to mathematicians working in the relevant area to find ones willing to take on the role of advisor, co-author, reviewers, etc. Basically just follow the same process that a postdoc would to publish a paper.
You're just moving the problem around. Instead of OpenAI and Anthropic dumping proofs, you'd instead have someone (maybe an aspiring graduate student, maybe a hobbyist, maybe an established mathematician who has disdain for existing process) dump these proofs en masse personally.
Dumping the one proof they have access to, sticking their name next to “OpenAI” and having it preside over reams of incomprehensible slop? Instead of taking a few months to digest, improve, rework it? I mean, maybe a few would, but I don’t think this objection holds much water.
I imagine that would take months at least. Meanwhile, only a selected few get to have access to what might be some of the most significant developments in mathematics. That seems incredibly unfair.
Potentially years, for the most important problems with the densest thickets of agentic reasoning to cut through! But if that is what it takes, then that is what it takes, it’s not possible to win faster. Dumping it early is not winning faster, it is losing, specifically by forfeiting and tossing the table so no one else can win either. Very unsportsmanlike.
And I do not buy that it is “unfair” either. That argument proves far too much - it would equally apply to peer review, editing, revising, publication, and indeed any non-essential activity by the author from the moment of their epiphany onward.
Note also that my suggestion is something I came up with on the spot in a handful of seconds for a field I am entirely unfamiliar with. It should be trivial in the extreme for a well-compensated and motivated professional familiar with the field to take a few weeks and vastly improve on it.
What would a more “responsible” approach have been?