The original article is written in Korean by myself Link. Part of it was submitted to Proofs and Prompts.

Yesterday, OpenAI dumped more than 700 research ‘paper’ in GitHub. When I see the list of problems, I was so surprised that they announced the solution to the Falconer distance problem, local smoothing estimates for wave operators, and bounds for Kakeya maximal functions. These were central problems in harmonic analysis, and my friend has worked on one of these problems for 6 years, but OpenAI’s abrupt announcement devastated the world that she has cared about. I have started my math journey from a harmonic analysis perspective. I know the meaning of the problem for her and my colleagues and I really have a deep, bitter resentment toward this situation.

After this mess, OpenAI retracted three papers and added additional formalized paper. However, there is ongoing debate whether it is fully formalized as it is stated in the manuscript, so many people also pointed out the credibility of their code even though it passed comparator test.

Some movie script and old saying from my teacher popped into my head.

  • Abandon Hope, and cheer up (희망을 버려. 그리고 힘내).
  • Keeping a campfire is more important than making a big fire (불을 키우는것보다 모닥불을 꺼뜨리지 않는 것이 중요하다.)

I should keep going and embrace this new change since mathematics made my life exist.

I kept thinking about the old play that I recently saw . Am I Ranevsky, who is just sad about the past, or just Trofimov, who talks about ideology? My Cherry Orchard, which is full of curiosity shared with my peers, is being razed. I tried to find a new land, but my cherish Cherry Orchard disappers. In the play, Lopakhin destoryed Cherry Orchard from a belief on the new era but he feels something missing.

I was happy to have numerical experiments with the aid of AI. I could come up with a new style of questions. I don’t know how to answer yet, but I believe that this will bring a perspective to my research area. I was hopeful for this future. However, the recent activity of OpenAI kept me thinking that they are just trying to flex their dominance through raw speed and brute-force resources, not respecting the time for contemplating and historical developments in the area.

OpenAI claimed that they brought a new development for mathematics. It is a really historical moment without any doubt. However, the paper uploaded to their GitHub cannot be accepted as responsible behavior nor a genuine mathematical advancement. How can this unreadable flood of data be regarded as “Knowledge”? On the other hand, someone reached out to me whether I am interested in working with his AI agent on new discovery on the Navier-Stokes equations. I immediate declined his offer.

It is really hard for me to endure this turmoil without watching the fall leaves turn red, the sea, and the sky.