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Re:OpenAI Withdraws 3 Math Papers by crimsoneer on Thursday October 08, 2026 @08:33AM (#50005062)
This is how science is meant to work.
Re:OpenAI Withdraws 3 Math Papers by mahogany on Thursday October 08, 2026 @09:32AM (#50005631)
No, it's not how math works at all. Math is not experimental science. Results take years to formulate and are generally known to be true by colleagues via correspondence and seminars before a paper is even written. Retraction is very rare.

I don't know why people are talking about something like this that they are clearly not familiar with.

Re:OpenAI Withdraws 3 Math Papers by moregrist on Thursday October 08, 2026 @08:49AM (#50005208)
Most good scientists work hard to prove results to themselves before going public.

Peer review is then done _in private_ before publication as a check on quality and significance.

Retracting a paper is pretty embarrassing. And not considered science as usual.

Re:OpenAI Withdraws 3 Math Papers by nimonian on Thursday October 08, 2026 @09:26AM (#50005581)
The greatest proof ever written by man, Andrew Wiles' FLT, was published with a flaw before being retracted and reworked. It's _completely_ normal in mathematics to find flaws in the argument. That's what peer review in mathematics is _for_.

Besides which it's not clear if these papers are considered published or preprint since they appear in no journal, so it's not really a retraction.

It's also very very normal to post preprints on Arxiv before peer review, so it's not the case that mathematics is kept private during review.

Re:OpenAI Withdraws 3 Math Papers by mtlmtlmtlmtl on Thursday October 08, 2026 @10:15AM (#50006074)
Not true. Wiles presented his proof in a series of lectures in 1993. The error was found by a reviewer, and he spent over a year trying to fix it. Once he did fix it, he asked colleagues to review it again, and only once it passed that review did he actually publish it.
Re:OpenAI Withdraws 3 Math Papers by rpdillon on Thursday October 08, 2026 @08:56AM (#50005271)
Retraction is after publication and peer review, no?
Re:OpenAI Withdraws 3 Math Papers by dwattttt on Thursday October 08, 2026 @08:37AM (#50005115)
Yes. A researcher who achieves a reputation of making mistakes carries that reputation.
Re:OpenAI Withdraws 3 Math Papers by idiotsecant on Thursday October 08, 2026 @09:11AM (#50005421)
No, scientists check their work before releasing it. Slop is still slop if you wrap it up as an academic result.