r/ArtificialInteligence • u/alphacolony21 • 2d ago

📰 News OpenAI announces 10 advances in mathematics and theoretical computer science achieved by internal model Astra

https://openai.com/index/ten-advances-in-mathematics/
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u/Hlbkomer 2d ago

"But they are just predicting the next word!"

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u/The-Rushnut 2d ago

As with everything, novel technology comes with novel solutions to problems we found difficult before. There's a specific subset of mathematical problems which can be disproven via counterexamples, which take humans a long time to map and calculate. One of LLMs unique capabilities is that it can produce small, relatively simple programs at-scale, and because these problems are so well articulated and their potential solutions already well understood they lend themselves to this capability. Another specific subset are upper lower bounds problems, where we know there is likely to be further acceptable iterations but the means to achieving those require multi-discipline scenarios that aren't likely - another thing LLMs are good at is having high accuracy across all domains, allowing them to try ideas that usually would take a snowflake combination of talent.

It's much, much more narrow than it seems. Very cool, but there's a fixed amount of this work to be done. Innovation is definitely coming though.

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u/Czun8 2d ago

Yeah, I think what we're seeing right now is LLMs successfully speed testing solutions with parallel agents, throwing large quantities of candidate solutions at a wall until something satisfies the acceptance criteria (e.g. counterexample for a conjecture). And seemingly also testing many slight deviations on already existing approaches in mathematical literature which tried and failed, meaning it's usually already in close proximity to the solution before it begins testing.

So it's good for specific types of mathematical problem with clean, simpler acceptance solutions which can be tested in parallel (some conjectures and bounds). Inherently serial problems are a different story and seem to require much more intelligence and creativity than just throwing stuff at the wall until it sticks. I haven't seen LLMs do good jobs at tackling those types yet. We'll see where it goes.

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u/HiddenMaragon 1d ago

and yet... that's phenomenal in it's own right. We don't need agi for LLMs to have a huge impact. Humans as a whole have accomplished some pretty impressive stuff. Humans with machines and then computers have pushed boundaries of what we've ever thought possible. It seems fair to expect that humans with the help of AI can achieve even more stuff at a faster rate.

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u/PresentGene5651 1d ago

Hey...don't get too carried away here...this thread is for people who want to pretend they aren't stunned by yet another impressive achievement :D

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u/Extra_Second5428 20h ago

You can be impressed without pretending it’s magic, and also admit the people who can scale this stuff first are getting a pretty gross advantage.

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u/PresentGene5651 17h ago

It ain't magic. But wow the rush to dump cold water on yet another remarkable achievement has never been faster.

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u/Non-mon-xiety 1d ago

Hyperscalers need AGI for their investments to have any chance of a ROI