GPT-5.6 used a prompt to close a 30-year gap in convex optimization • Hacker News Board

Re: GPT-5.6 used a prompt to close a 30-year gap in convex optimization

#411

Post by vrighter » Mon, Jul 20, 2026, 11:55 AM UTC

xeromal wrote: post #180

alexpotato wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> so advanced that it's just as readable to me as Greek I used to feel this way about statistics. The language and terms are hard to understand and many of the formulas are taught as "just memorize this" instead of building up from first principles. But then I started using statistics to analyze something I cared a lot about (paintball) and I quickly realized it's like learning anything new: - there is jargon - and c…

I gotta know what you use stats for regarding paintball. I haven't played in years but I loved playing back in the tipman 98 custom era (not sure if that's still a popular marker).

same here. Then I started writing a path tracer and now i think in probabilities

Re: GPT-5.6 used a prompt to close a 30-year gap in convex optimization

#412

Post by rocqua » Mon, Jul 20, 2026, 1:07 PM UTC

sigbottle wrote: post #248

rocqua wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems to me you hooked onto the wrong part of proofs vs software compared to what OP meant. The difference OP cares about isn’t how much one cares about style. Instead the important difference lies in validation. A proof can be validated as either correct or wrong. That type of hard feedback really helps combat the optimism and desire for shortcuts of modern models. Now, that still doesn’t help an LLM distinguish…

The standards of proof are different from the fundamental operation of "OK, cool, you solved this problem. Why does this problem matter? Isn't it useless? Senseless? Meaningless?" You have this same question whether or not you're in an a priori discipline (mathematics), scientific fields proper, or engineering. "Absolute certainty" has nothing to do with it. I can assure you, people on the job are not looking for The…

That's a valuable extra distinction between Mathematics and Software.

In Mathematics there is much more clarity on what question you want to answer. It's much less likely you get an answer to a question, and then realize that the question was useless. Whereas in software its almost guaranteed that your first implementation, correct or otherwise, will solve the wrong problem.

Re: GPT-5.6 used a prompt to close a 30-year gap in convex optimization

#413

Post by rurban » Mon, Jul 20, 2026, 2:20 PM UTC

bjt12345 wrote: post #383

I can't see this article as Reddit doesn't allow me to view it. Do we have to use Reddit though? It's a horrible website.

You have to replace www. with old. Then it works. When I submitted the very same link, HN replaced the good old prefix with the bad prefix www.

Re: GPT-5.6 used a prompt to close a 30-year gap in convex optimization

#414

Post by sigbottle » Tue, Jul 21, 2026, 7:13 PM UTC

rocqua wrote: post #412

sigbottle wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The standards of proof are different from the fundamental operation of "OK, cool, you solved this problem. Why does this problem matter? Isn't it useless? Senseless? Meaningless?" You have this same question whether or not you're in an a priori discipline (mathematics), scientific fields proper, or engineering. "Absolute certainty" has nothing to do with it. I can assure you, people on the job are not looking for The…

That's a valuable extra distinction between Mathematics and Software. In Mathematics there is much more clarity on what question you want to answer. It's much less likely you get an answer to a question, and then realize that the question was useless. Whereas in software its almost guaranteed that your first implementation, correct or otherwise, will solve the wrong problem.

Really? Not my experience at all.

If you're saying that math has a consolidating network effect, sure. There are a lot of people who think similar problems are important. I guarantee you that when math was small, that is not the case, and when coming up with new math, that's not the case, and when coming up with sub problems to tackle large problems, that is not the case.