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Video pre-release: The story of generative AI and Erdős problems (Patreon)

Published:
2026-07-05 22:53:59
Edited:
2026-07-05 22:54:46
Imported:
2026-07

Content

Director Rhys here! This video has been bubbling away in the background for quite some time (all explained in the video itself), but new developments forced Matt's hand into filming whilst on vacation in Australia. Again. The trend seems to be Matt goes on vacation, maths happens. Either we keep him at home, or send him away more for extra maths. Which will it be?

Hope you enjoy the video. Please do give any feedback and comments here. I'm still mystified as to how a coat can bring so much joy to Matt... Thanks!

Files

Is AI better at maths than humans?

New York City’s An Evening of Unnecessary Detail on July 12th, get your tickets here: https://www.ticketmaster.com/matt-parker-an-evening-of-unnecessary-brooklyn-new-york-07-12-2026/event/300064B84CCCF567 Thomas Bloom’s site documenting the Erdős problems: www.erdosproblems.com A full state of play (up to June 30 2026) on AI contributions to Erdős problems can be found here: https://github.com/teorth/Erdősproblems/wiki/AI-contributions-to-Erd%C5%91s-problems A simplified interactive visualisation to new unit distance problem constructions is here: https://chatgpt.com/canvas/shared/6a15da73c5b08191a2dc34c3ac6ceca6 More details on each solved Erdős problem referenced in the video can be found below categorized by problem number: Erdős problem #1043 https://www.erdosproblems.com/1043 Commentary from Sebastien Bubeck: https://x.com/SebastienBubeck/status/1980311866770653632 Terry Tao’s Mathstodon post: https://mathstodon.xyz/@tao/115385022005130505 Erdős problem #1026 https://www.erdosproblems.com/1026 Terry Tao’s blog on the solution: https://terrytao.wordpress.com/2025/12/08/the-story-of-Erdős-problem-126/ Erdős problem #728 https://www.erdosproblems.com/728 Terry Tao’s Mathstodon post: https://mathstodon.xyz/@tao/115855840223258103 Kevin Barreto’s blog post about AI and problem 728: https://www.erdosproblems.com/forum/thread/blog:2 Writeup of the Aristotle’s Lean proof: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1MRQfcHhrYMfMTvlZcMC3zEK7aOrUyHiQ/view Erdős problem #1196 https://www.erdosproblems.com/1196 Link to the paper on Arxiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.00301 Record of Liam Price’s initial conversation with Chat GPT: https://chatgpt.com/share/69dd1c83-b164-8385-bf2e-8533e9baba9c Erdős problem #90 https://www.erdosproblems.com/90 Remarks on the disproof of the conjecture: https://cdn.openai.com/pdf/74c24085-19b0-4534-9c90-465b8e29ad73/unit-distance-remarks.pdf Lean programming language: https://lean-lang.org/ Here are the details on Arxiv’s rules around AI in submitted papers: https://www.reddit.com/r/math/s/G3tJfBTdSB Here’s the paper I mention at the very end of the video: https://arxiv.org/html/2605.22763v1 Leiden Decleration on AI and Mathematics: https://leidendeclaration.ai/ A subsequent discovery post Unit Distance Conjecture: https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.28781 Huge thanks to my Patreon supporters. They are all unit distance pairs to the channel! https://www.patreon.com/standupmaths Were the passers by bemused by me, sitting at a desk drinking coffee on the beach? We’ll never find out for sure but it’s safe to say maybe. CORRECTIONS None so far. Let me know if you spot anything! Editing by Gus Melton Written, filmed, and performed by Matt Parker Produced by Nicole Jacobus Content wrangling by Rhys Jones Music by Howard Carter Design by Simon Wright and Adam Robinson MATT PARKER: Stand-up Mathematician Website: http://standupmaths.com/

Comments

John Doe

This is an excellent treatment of an important and complicated topic. Here is a bit of fine print that you may or may not want to use to tweak the final video. Lean is indeed a powerful tool and is sometimes used by AI systems that are trying to do math. I mostly agree with Matt's take on Lean near the end of this video. However, the disproof of the unit distance conjecture did not use Lean. Similarly, DeepMind's silver medal performance in the IMO 2024 used Lean, but its gold medal performance in the IMO 2025 did not use Lean at all. A surprising and still somewhat mysterious fact is that LLMs are somehow able to perform high-level mathematics reasoning without having the rules of mathematical logic directly "hard-wired" in. It remains a hotly debated topic how much Lean can be or should be used to help AI systems do math. There were a number of other Erdos problems that were "milestones" of sorts in the AI story, such as 124, 481, and 367. There's certainly no need to mention them all, but maybe there could be a brief acknowledgment that Matt is just picking a few highlights. Some viewers may be slightly confused that early in the video, when Erdos problems are introduced, they are played up as being a big deal, but then later, the ones solved by AI are played down as not being that big a deal compared to the unit distance conjecture. The reality, of course, is that some Erdos problems are a much bigger deal than others. Thomas Bloom deserves a lot of credit for hunting down every last Erdos problem he could find, but as a consequence, a lot of them are of only marginal interest. The unit distance conjecture was one that not only had $500 attached but was very famous; lots of top-notch mathematicians had taken a crack at it and failed. The other problems had not been attacked as hard by as many people.

DScott

I enjoyed the fact that AI is leaning on LEAN, while Matt's furniture leans on his footwear ... but then begs the question, "how many thongs were harmed in the making of this video and still allowed Matt to get around and stabilise a 4 legged table?"

Timur Sultanov

Of course we send him on vacations more... for the greater good of humanity

_ericBG

As one of the people who made Aristotle, it's pretty cool to see it being covered here :)

Christian Leichsenring

I mean, going to Australia in winter in one way to escape the European heat domes in summer...

Christ van Willegen

I was watching this on my phone (landscape, maximized view), and I know that the problems' web pages shown are "for illustration purposes only", but they are not readable at all. Thanks for sharing this interesting video nonetheless!