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Old and new apps, via modern coding agents by Terry Tao

144 points by subset 4 hours ago | 31 comments

Terry Tao using coding agents to build apps means we're one step away from a Fields Medalist asking an LLM why his Docker container won't start, just like the rest of us.

larme 2 hours ago

Before LLM there has already been Fields medalist[0] who creates professional software[1].

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Hairer

[1]: https://www.hairersoft.com/

skinfaxi 2 hours ago

This is a very humbling thought, thank you.

dist-epoch 38 minutes ago

I'm waiting for the reverse, coding agents asking Terry Tao if the proof they plan working on is worthy of a Fields Medal

recursivedoubts 37 minutes ago

Building visualizations with LLMs has been a major boost for my CS classes:

https://htmx.org/essays/universities-and-ai/#demos-visualiza...

Many visualizations that I have always wanted but just didn't have the time to build, I now have.

To give an example, I wanted a simplified 8-bit computer to complement the 16-bit teaching computer I use and designed this in a few days with the help of claude:

https://bdp.cs.montana.edu/

wffurr 3 hours ago

Nice balanced perspective there at the end:

"as such [LLM-coded interactive] supplements are not mission-critical to the core of the paper, I again feel that the downside risk of using guided interaction with LLM agents to generate such visualizations is acceptable."

It's a tool. Good for some things but not others and generally not to be trusted.

an0malous 26 minutes ago

> and generally not to be trusted

There are many AI bulls who adamantly disagree and cite Tao’s statements about LLMs for mathematical proofs as an example of how advanced and autonomous these systems already are

alansaber 2 hours ago

I always enjoy these "domain expert has fun using AI to do something in their domain" articles. But it's always a hobby project, never something serious.

rsfern 42 minutes ago

Terry Tao has actually been one of the more prominent voices in the math community exploring AI for cutting edge mathematical discovery. This particular post is a bit softer but he has also written a lot about using AI assistance for serious core research

Nov 2025: https://terrytao.wordpress.com/tag/artificial-intelligence/

https://academy.openai.com/public/blogs/terence-tao-ai-is-re...

jebarker 38 minutes ago

What makes this a hobby project? He’s a university professor so developing teaching material is part of his job.

cma 44 minutes ago

But he's also using AI for formally verified math and for ideas in solving math problems. The part about it being ok because it is a supplement just means ok that these aren't formally verified and may have bugs.

dboreham 42 minutes ago

Serious things tend to be long and tedious and potentially full of proprietary information.

koe123 2 hours ago

I am far from a mathematician but I am excited by the possibilities of using AI for generating more math. Math in my mind exists purely in the world of forms, and cannot be appropriated for profit, but is downstream to everything else. I am keen to see what this enables.

vatsachak 2 hours ago

Using LLMs to generate dashboards is probably their most productive use case

muragekibicho 2 hours ago

The article's awkward opening statement proves it wasn't written by AI.

I have been interested in machine-assisted ways to do and teach mathematics from as far back as 1999, when I started coding several applets in Java 1.0, both for my complex analysis and linear algebra courses, to visualize various mathematical objects I was interested in (such as honeycombs or Besicovitch sets).

kccqzy 41 minutes ago

It’s very much Terrence Tao style. His style is having long sentences that could have been broken down into shorter sentences but he chose not to. It doesn’t really affect reading comprehension.

jdw64 53 minutes ago

His website using mathematical knowledge is refreshing. There's a small UI bug, but personally, I wish more educational materials were this rich in audiovisual content.

haebom 28 minutes ago

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chumzygood 2 hours ago

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pizzaballs 3 hours ago

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geeewhy 3 hours ago

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cindyllm 2 hours ago

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jgalt212 3 hours ago

The more Terry talks about AI, the more I'm starting to feel like Terry may have some undisclosed conflicts of interest.

https://www.reddit.com/r/mathematics/comments/1tryyw7/terenc...

sega_sai 2 hours ago

When it comes to coding, non-programmers do not have to be in a defensive position worried that their job is under risk, instead they just see a great tool that saves them time, especially doing boring coding like dashboards, visualizations, interactive web-pages, or doing experiments that they otherwise would not have time for.

simonw 2 hours ago

A lot of mathematicians are worried: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2026/06/mathematicians-w...

jdright 2 hours ago

Mathematicians are a kind of programmers, the original ones.

lagrange77 2 hours ago

Why are mathematicians a kind of programmers? Besides applied maths, aren't they more researchers that explore and discover, in contrast to the majority of programmers who are more like handymen?

lowsong 2 hours ago

"When it comes to a field I'm not an expert in, AI is a great tool."

Every time.

azan_ 46 minutes ago

Tao is not an expert in math research? That's a really high bar then.

alansaber 2 hours ago

Yes, because AI gets the "shape" of something right. If you don't know the field you don't notice the pockmarked surface.

lagrange77 2 hours ago

I think the opposite is true.

wizzwizz4 51 minutes ago

So does anyone familiar with the Gell-Mann amnesia effect.

perching_aix 50 minutes ago

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hansmayer 2 hours ago

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nmfisher 3 hours ago

Or he just finds it an incredible time-saving tool to help him do more maths.

perching_aix 2 hours ago

The well-known shadowy bias and conflict of interest of "I just enjoy experimenting with this new thing".

hansmayer 2 hours ago

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suwapat 58 minutes ago

LLM will do very good job in pure mathematics since it don't need the senses to logically understand/conclude a given topic.