Terence Tao on How AI Is Changing Mathematics

Summary
This video is an official profile produced by OpenAI featuring mathematician Terence Tao (UCLA Professor and Director of Special Projects at IPAM) discussing how AI tools are transforming mathematical research and collaboration. OpenAI Chief Research Officer Mark Chen also speaks about OpenAI’s goal of empowering researchers to automate and accelerate scientific discovery.

What is shown

• [00:00] Terence Tao writing mathematical formulas and bounds on a blackboard.
• [00:10] Tao collaborating with Dominique Maldague (Assistant Professor in Pure Mathematics, UCLA) while reviewing equations on a laptop.
• [00:23] Tao writing further proofs and interacting with colleagues at the blackboard.
• [00:31] Mark Chen outlining OpenAI’s research direction in scientific automation.
• [00:51] Tao at his desk writing notes, equations, and polyhedral diagrams on paper surrounded by research books.

Claims & numbers

• Terence Tao states that AI enables him to experiment, attempt “crazier things”, offload unwanted computations, search literature far more effectively, and reduce “cognitive frictions down to zero.”
• Mark Chen states that OpenAI aims to enable “100 mathematicians out there” to achieve breakthrough results like a Nobel Prize or Fields Medal rather than winning such prizes directly.

Notable quotes

• [00:13] “We can vibe on the blackboard and then if there’s a computation that neither of us wants to do, we can just get our AI tools to finish that.” — Terence Tao
• [00:38] “We care less about winning a Nobel Prize or a Fields Medal and more about enabling 100 mathematicians out there to do that for themselves.” — Mark Chen
• [00:45] “We lived in the world of cognitive friction until very recently, where every task required us to use our brain.” — Terence Tao

Assessment
This is an official promotional spotlight video rather than a live software demo or technical benchmark presentation. No specific models, user prompts, code executions, or verified outputs are shown in detail on screen.

Described by gemini-3.8-flash on 2026-10-12 from the video’s audio and frames.