These AI ads are getting better and better by the day.
Could you elaborate, please? Does your point imply that mathematical discoveries achieved with LLM's aren't real?
No country for mediocre mathematicians
61–70 of 159 posts
Re: No country for mediocre mathematicians
#62It's interesting that this piece stands well enough if you replace mathematics with probably any other intellectual profession, including software development or pretty much anything else. And, I lie to anyone who asks me why I’m a mathematician. It is much easier to claim “I love learning the laws of life,” while literally handwaving, than it is for me to flashback to the twenty or so pivotal moments that lead to me…
A PhD in Arithmetic Geometry and a publication in a top tier journal is hardly mediocre in and of itself, as far the author is concerned. The equivalent for a software engineer is probably a leading AI engineer, with a strong publication count. I think a lot of people who are not mediocre are unaware of what mediocrity actually is. Yeah if you're only in the top .1% and comparing yourself to the literal best in the w…
As a professional mathematician, if you’re not advancing your subfield of research consistently you are mediocre.
Re: No country for mediocre mathematicians
#63Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah seems like most programmers just do it for the money. I imagine only like 20% of us do it just because we enjoy it.
I feel like the number is higher for software work where I'm at, and lower for every other profession. Scary when you think that your doctor is in it for the money
idk, a lot of American doctors I've met seemed to be in it because they like school and stability. Though perhaps a similar scary.
Re: No country for mediocre mathematicians
#64> Lying is a core part of communicating mathematics. We lie to kindergarteners when explaining fractions. We lie to fourth graders when approaching limits... Hard disagree. Lying is with intention to deceive. Teaching is simplifying with the intention that they understand and get the correct intuition. Math is not about lying, that's just silly.
Terry Pratchett, The Science of Discworld : > As humans, we have invented lots of useful kinds of lie. As well as lies-to-children ('as much as they can understand') there are lies-to-bosses ('as much as they need to know') lies-to-patients ('they won't worry about what they don't know') and, for all sorts of reasons, lies-to-ourselves. > Lies-to-children is simply a prevalent and necessary kind of lie. Universities…
Brilliant
Re: No country for mediocre mathematicians
#65Really enjoyable read. I escaped a career in Mathematics by being sufficiently bad at it that I only have a Masters. Fortunately, I escaped to a field immune to AI: CS and then a software engineering career. Well, not really, but I did get a good 15 years out of it so thank god for that.
About half of my friends are founders of various startups and the rest are executives of and almost all of them have the view that it’s better for everything to be a failure than to be in the “it could make it” category for half a decade or more.
In that way, I am glad I found that it wasn’t for me. I had the curiosity, but not the doggedness to face difficulty (not enough curiosity perhaps?) or the ability to not encounter such difficulty. And fortunately that meant I was never in the “I could make it” category. God bless clear and present boundaries and may the devil take the grey zone.
Re: No country for mediocre mathematicians
#66> Lying is a core part of communicating mathematics. We lie to kindergarteners when explaining fractions. We lie to fourth graders when approaching limits... Hard disagree. Lying is with intention to deceive. Teaching is simplifying with the intention that they understand and get the correct intuition. Math is not about lying, that's just silly.
Terry Pratchett, The Science of Discworld : > As humans, we have invented lots of useful kinds of lie. As well as lies-to-children ('as much as they can understand') there are lies-to-bosses ('as much as they need to know') lies-to-patients ('they won't worry about what they don't know') and, for all sorts of reasons, lies-to-ourselves. > Lies-to-children is simply a prevalent and necessary kind of lie. Universities…
I don't get it?
Nevertheless you don't have to lie to kids in any field, science, art or otherwise.
Re: No country for mediocre mathematicians
#67It's interesting that this piece stands well enough if you replace mathematics with probably any other intellectual profession, including software development or pretty much anything else. And, I lie to anyone who asks me why I’m a mathematician. It is much easier to claim “I love learning the laws of life,” while literally handwaving, than it is for me to flashback to the twenty or so pivotal moments that lead to me…
A PhD in Arithmetic Geometry and a publication in a top tier journal is hardly mediocre in and of itself, as far the author is concerned. The equivalent for a software engineer is probably a leading AI engineer, with a strong publication count. I think a lot of people who are not mediocre are unaware of what mediocrity actually is. Yeah if you're only in the top .1% and comparing yourself to the literal best in the w…
It's still impressive, but it's not enough.
Re: No country for mediocre mathematicians
#68> My physicist friend once asked me what the point of doing research was if someone like Terence Tao could have figured out everything in my dissertation in a tenth of the time. I answered by pointing out that Terence Tao didn’t. Terence Tao did not find a small open problem posited by my advisor and publish a bite sized result making incremental progress. He has only so much time and so many other fish to fry. This…
> My physicist friend once asked me what the point of doing research was if someone like Terence Tao could have figured out everything in my dissertation in a tenth of the time. That's really mean thing to say
It's actually a really dumb thing to say and OP's response is the best one because it's a microcosm about how the world works. For every Terence Tao there's probably 20 more people cranking out high-quality work that's just a little less inspired. Their work is valuable and important, and asking that question is devaluing the entire endeavor of human knowledge. It's essentially positing that nobody else can contribute anything if it's not on that same level. It's like asking "why bother competing in marathons if you haven't won any?" Well that's not the point.
Re: No country for mediocre mathematicians
#69Earlier quoted context omitted.
Whenever there is a breaking AI-generated proof, it's the job of actual leading mathematicians to formalize/check it . Laypeople are not checking or writing these AI-assisted proofs. Even when Lean is used, it's mathematicians writing these proofs and checking if the formalization was done right. Terrance Tao's career trajectory has reached new highs due to AI. He's more relevant than ever. This is the exact opposite…
To the credit of the original commenter, that is why they said "give it one or two years". _Right now_ we need the experts to formalize/check. They're saying they think LLMs will reach a point in the near future where that won't be necessary.
All we need experts for right now is verifying the formalization of the statement of the problem is correct. The proof itself, that formalization is checked automatically.
Re: No country for mediocre mathematicians
#70Earlier quoted context omitted.
I feel like the number is higher for software work where I'm at, and lower for every other profession. Scary when you think that your doctor is in it for the money
There are plenty of easier ways to make money than becoming a doctor.
They tend to be higher risk though. If you've got the capacity for memorizing all the stuff you need to become a doctor, there's not much risk involved in attaining your doctor salary.