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Terence Tao is the best mathematician in the world. He has recognized that he is using AI to solve one of the Millennium Problems

March 24, 2026 by usatoday24

Stating outright which person is the best in the world at something is risky. If we stick to cutting-edge research in the field of mathematics the German Peter Scholze, the British James Maynard or the Chinese-American Yitang Zhang, among other researchers, are usually considered the most capable living mathematicians. However, in the scientific community there is an almost unanimous consensus that Terence Tao, who has dual Australian and American nationality, is the authentic “Mozart of mathematics.” His prestige has been earned hard. He won the Fields Medal, which is often considered the Nobel Prize in mathematicsin 2006, when he was 31 years old. And he was awarded it for his contributions in three fundamental areas: number theory, partial differential equations and harmonic analysis. However, the Fields Medal committee especially highlighted his ability to connect areas that most mathematicians considered isolated. In any case, this is not all. Tao is often admired for his versatility. Many elite mathematicians specialize in a specific field, but this scientist has produced cutting-edge work in combinatorics and compressed detection, in addition to the three areas for which he received the Fields Medal. And, furthermore, he has earned a reputation as a generous researcher who works very well in a team and is always willing to adopt new technologies to address the greatest mathematical challenges. AI is an essential tool in mathematics for Terence Tao Dwarkesh Patel, an Indian-American content creator specializing in technology and artificial intelligence (IA) who has established himself as one of the most influential voices in Silicon Valley thanks to his interviews with Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Satya Nadella, Ilya Sutskever and Demis Hassabis, published just a few days ago a very interesting conversation with Terence Tao. And AI has been the absolute protagonist of a dialogue in which this mathematician has enthusiastically defended the role that this technology already has as a “trusted co-author” in research in the area of mathematics. Terence Tao is currently one of the biggest promoters of Lean within the scientific community In October 2024 Meta AIMeta’s AI, managed to generalize the Lyapunov function. Russian mathematician Aleksander Lyapunov proposed the concept of the function that bears his name in 1892. His work is a very important tool in the study of dynamical systems, but mathematicians have struggled since then to find a general method that would allow them to identify Lyapunov functions. And they were not successful. However, Meta AI has had it. This is just one example that clearly illustrates the capacity that AI already has when it comes to facing some mathematical challenges. Terence Tao does not believe that AI will end up replacing researchers; argues that it is actually a very valuable tool that allows mathematicians to leave behind individual research and collaborate on much larger and more ambitious projects. And he leads by example. In fact, you have introduced Lean into your daily workflow. This tool is a proof assistant and programming language designed to verify mathematical reasoning and verify that it is completely correct. Tao is currently one of the biggest proponents of Lean within the scientific community. “I hope that the AI of 2026, when used correctly, will be a trusted co-author in research in mathematics. And in many other fields as well,” defends Terence Tao. He is currently using this technology to confront some of the biggest math challenges there aresuch as the Collatz conjecture or the Navier-Stokes equations. The latter give shape to one of the Millennium Problems and they seek, broadly speaking, to understand how fluids behave. Interestingly, these equations are constantly used to predict the weather or design airplanes, among many other applications, but we still don’t understand precisely how they work. Terence Tao and AI are one of our best assets when it comes to definitively solving this enigma. Image | Generated by Xataka with Gemini More information | Dwarkesh Patel In Xataka | These two problems have baffled mathematicians for decades. A genius has solved them with a stroke of the pen

He won an art contest with an image made with Midjourney. Now he is fighting in court to be recognized as an artist

October 21, 2025 by usatoday24

It seems like an eternity has passed, but in 2022, AI image generation tools were already achieving the most convincing results. And if not, tell the participants in the Colorado art contest, who saw how An image created with Midjourney took first prize in the ‘digital art’ category. The controversy was afoot: can we call something that an AI does art? Its author is very clear about this and has gone to court to defend it. What has happened? Jason Allen, the author of the image (or rather, the prompt), tried to register ‘Théâtre D’opéra Spatial’ a month after winning the contest, but was not allowed. According to the US Copyright Officethe image contains “more than a minimal amount of artificial intelligence-generated content.” Allen began a legal battle to get the image registered. According to what they say in 404medialast August they filed a request in court defending that it is a work of art and Allen an artist. The prompt. Although it was created by software, Allen states that the creation of the prompt is an artistic process in itself and therefore should be considered an artist. In the text presented to the court, his lawyers defend that “he created the image by providing hundreds of iterative text prompts (…) to help express his intellectual vision.” However, for the copyright office, just providing the instructions was not enough and they repeatedly rejected his request. Art or not. The news unleashed a wave of criticism on networks and brought to the table the debate of whether images generated with AI should be considered art. This controversy has polarized the artistic and technological community, creating two marked and opposing positions: on the one hand, those who They consider that it cannot be considered art because it lacks human intentionality, on the other hand those who defend that AI is one more tool with which the artist expresses himselfjust like a brush, a graphics tablet or a camera. It’s not the first time. Art has faced more debates like this and there is a very clear example. The same thing is happening with AI that happened with photography in the 19th century; was rejected by defenders of drawing and paintingwho saw their jobs threatened by new technology. More than a century later, photography is considered art and fills galleries and museums. And most importantly, the painting still exists. The intention. The debate arises when mechanical means come into play. In the case of photography it was the camera and with AI it is software, very complex but software nonetheless. If we accept that photography, digital illustration or 3D modeling are art, AI can be too. The key that makes the difference is the intention behind it. Setting any prompt and sticking with the first result that comes to mind is not the same as having a clear idea, a story to tell, a feeling to express, and looking for the result that captures it as best as possible. Of course, it would be fair that those works compete in their own category. The problem. AI has turned the art community against it from the beginning. Image generators, especially the first ones, were trained with countless works of art by authors who received nothing in return. Some authors they began to “poison” their works for AI to go crazy and there are several initiatives that artists can join to prevent your jobs from ending up training AI. Image | Jason Allen and Midjourney In Xataka | Either you pay or we will use your works to train AI: the threat of hackers to an artists’ website

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