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paxy • today at 2:40 AM • 2 replies • view on HN

The approach hasn't changed all that much. It's more that the scientific community is slowly starting to accept the inevitable.


Replies

InfinityByTen • today at 5:01 AM

The hubris in the framing is astonishing, amusing and sad all at the same time. Many say, that's what HN attracts. Anyone who talks about inevitability except of death in these times is just someone who considers they'd be in the "have" rather the "have not" category.

I still can't see what this means for human understanding and how open would this knowledge be. Who'd ultimately get access to this stuff going forward and what kind of power games would ensue hereon.

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stillpointlab • today at 2:58 AM

From the article:

> We reached out to external experts and asked them to act as shepherds, organizing groups to understand the new results. They advised three different release strategies

1. They identified relevant experts for each of the discoveries they wanted to release

2. They collaborated with them to determine how to release the results

The effect for the first two (maths, comp sci) was the same because the experts they chose made that decision.

The downside here is actually the third case (physics). Since they only chose 5 scientists (David Gross, Michael Douglas, Arthur Jaffe, Igor Klebanov, and Nikita Nekrasov) and those scientists chose to keep the results private until they finish their own work. Everyone else who might be interested has to wait.

That was my favouritism aside. Scientists working on similar or adjacent problems that are not included in these kinds of private releases might feel they are not getting a fair chance.

This is a process that will change, but it seems they listened to the anger from the math community and made changes that help address the concerns.

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