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cpardyesterday at 8:55 PM4 repliesview on HN

The proof brings unexpected, sophisticated ideas from algebraic number theory to bear on an elementary geometric question.

The more I read about these achievements the more I get a feeling that a lot of the power of these models comes from having prior knowledge on every possible field and having zero problems transferring to new domains.

To me the potential beauty of this is that these tools might help us break through the increasing super specialization that humans in science have to go through today. Which in one hand is important on the other hand does limit the person in terms of the tooling and inspiration it has access to.


Replies

efavdbtoday at 12:08 AM

It’s as if the body of human knowledge is our I’ve mind. It used to be expensive to access that, but no more.

Cool thing is now when someone contributes something to the hive mind, it can instantly be applied to any other problem people are working on.

keyleyesterday at 11:19 PM

I think you're on point, and you've explained it very well.

As we're becoming hyper specialised, they become an invaluable tool to merge the horizon in, so to speak.

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doubledamioyesterday at 9:05 PM

I’ve always been skeptical about the role of LLMs in mathematics, but this is the first time I’ve seen this argument, and I actually find it very compelling. Maybe LLMs will help us develop more horizontal understanding of the field.

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margorczynskiyesterday at 9:53 PM

Yep. The thing is people (maybe because of our limited scope) just focus on the depth and not the breadth. Because this is a general purpose model - it also has PhD+ knowledge in Physics, Biology, History, etc.

I think we still don't really comprehend how much can be achieved by a single "mind" that has internalized so much knowledge from so many areas.

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