Former Math Olympiad gold medalist Dr. Jasper Zhang breaks down how AI models from OpenAI and Google DeepMind solved combinatorial geometry Problem 1 at the International Mathematical Olympiad.
Assertion Supported
OpenAI's IMO performance was not officially verified by the IMO
“It turns out, like, OpenAI actually didn't involve officially with IMO. They just, like, use the problems, but, and then just, like, use their model to test the results, and ask, like, three previous IMO analysts to review them.”
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Scaling math AI becomes purely compute and data once auto-evaluation works
“And then my guess is, I believe in IL, so if for each category, we can figure out the A way to auto-evaluate the results, then after that, it will just be compute and data.”
Prediction Open · timeframe Jul 2028
Formalizing Fermat's Last Theorem in Lean is doable in 2-3 years
“It's I think definitely possible. Yeah. Like he, so the professor is Kevin buzzard and he got like a grant and now he just like focused on writing the proof for Ling. Like he's hoping to finish that in like two or three years. And then basically like if Ling i…”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Zhang confirms OpenAI's unverified IMO proofs are mathematically correct
“I read the proof that it's still correct, but it's just, like, less official, and that's why people kind of, like, kind of OpenAI received a few backlash over the weekend, and on Monday, DeepMind officially confirmed they have the gold medal and also fully ver…”
Insight
AI models fail at creative combinatorics problems requiring example construction
“If it's like a textbook stuff or like a step-by-step problem, then AI can solve it. But, however, if it requires, like, creativity especially, like, in combinatorics, you kind of need to create, ah, some example, and then try to prove them, ah, that it's the m…”
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Powerful math reasoning models will arrive soon using Lean as a verifier
“And so if you can just use lean to kind of become the verifier, then it's easy. So I think we probably will see very powerful reasoning models in, in math very soon.”