Most likely none of the thoughts contained in the following sentences I will write are novel but I think it is important for us raise and maintain awareness of their content.

With the increasing frequency of breakthroughs in theoretical science made autonomously by AI systems the question of the role of humans in this endeavor becomes progressively important and the question is raised, whether we are even needed.

One indication of this is the repeated appearance of claims of “math is solved” by anonymous or public accounts across social media. If “math is solved” and similar is supposed to be true, why are we needed? It is this question I want to discuss here.

First I want to make clear that I disagree with any claims of math being solved. Mathematics is infinitely large. It is practically impossible to “solve” it.

It seems to me that the core of this is related to the question: Why do we do science in the first place? What is the value of science done by humans?

Is it for technological development? Monetary gain? A thirst for knowledge?

I believe that a community of humans is integral for science and science done solely by machines is to a large part meaningless.

With this I DO NOT mean that machines doing science that has direct practical relevance is meaningless. Curing cancer is important and if machines can do this PLEASE do it. I think however that this is not the only importance of science.

First of all, what do I mean by science? To me, science is the process and result of the scientific method, i.e. the observation of phenomena (physical or theoretical), the forming of hypothesis, derivation and testing of their predictions by comparison with evidence and the repeated loop of this process until one arrives at a claim that is backed by evidence. This is true for mathematical as well as experimental work.

People have engaged with the world around them for millennia and tried to make sense of it one way or the other. We have tried to find the laws of planetary motion not only because they allow to improve navigation, but also because we wanted to understand the world around us. I believe this is to a large part what science tries to achieve: clarity and understanding about the world around us.

And it is our understanding that we try to improve. Without us, a community of humans who engage with the knowledge we produce in the process of doing science, it is meaningless.

I believe there is value in understanding and it is integral to our society. If we were to leave all of science to be done by machines, with no humans left to understand what they do, there is no use of them doing it. There is no use in a machine to solve the Riemann hypothesis if no human can understand and use the proof, because our understanding ends there.

If you believe there is no value in understanding and the only value that science brings is in direct practical implications or “use”, then I fear I have not much to tell you.

In my view this would be a very sad state of affairs, as a big part that makes us human - wonder about the world and a striving towards something greater, would have been lost. We would become victims to the opinions of machines whose reasons we can not understand as we have completely lost this ability.

So if you care about humans remaining able to think and do things, we have to continue to engage in science.

I am not sure what this will look like in the future - whether universities and research institutions in their current form will continue to exist. This to me is dangerous, not because I believe that we need to keep the system of academia alive, but because I believe that we need to keep the ability of us humans to engage with the world in a way that increases our understanding of it alive.

Only through this process we can progress and not lose the ability to engage meaningfully with the world.

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