While the world was debating the legal implications of ByteDance's video generators, OpenAI quietly dropped a bombshell that might be more significant than any viral video.
In a move that has stunned the mathematical community, OpenAI revealed that an internal model successfully solved 6 out of 10 problems from the "First Proof" challenge—a set of novel, unsolved research questions specifically designed to test frontier AI reasoning.
This isn't just "solving math homework." This is AI doing novel scientific discovery.
The "First Proof" Challenge
For years, skeptics have argued that Large Language Models (LLMs) are merely "stochastic parrots"—statistical engines that regurgitate patterns from their training data. They can solve textbook calculus problems because they've seen millions of similar examples. But can they solve something new?
The "First Proof" challenge was created to answer exactly that. It consists of 10 open research problems in mathematics—questions that:
- Are not in any textbook or training set.
- Require novel reasoning and creative insight.
- Have stumped human mathematicians or are at the cutting edge of current research.
According to OpenAI researcher Jakub Pachocki, the goal was to see if an AI could contribute to actual research, not just pass a test.
The Breakthrough: 6/10 in One Week
The results, shared by researchers including @kimmonismus and @veermasrani, are staggering.
OpenAI's internal model, running with minimal human supervision during a one-week side sprint, tackled the 10 problems. It produced promising solutions for most of them, with six believed to be likely correct.
To put this in perspective:
- These are not multiple-choice questions. They are rigorous mathematical proofs.
- The model didn't just "guess"; it constructed logical arguments that human experts are now verifying.
- It did this autonomously, without a human guiding it step-by-step through the logic.
As Veer Masrani noted, "It shifts the conversation from 'how well does it perform?' to 'can it genuinely discover?' If that becomes the new yardstick, the whole AI race changes tone."
Why This Matters (Beyond Math)
You might not care about abstract topology or number theory. But you should care about what this represents.
Until now, AI has been a tool for retrieval and synthesis. You ask it to write a contract, it synthesizes thousands of contracts it has seen. You ask it to code a website, it retrieves patterns from GitHub.
The "First Proof" result signals the transition to AI as a Researcher.
If an AI can solve a novel math problem, it can theoretically:
- Derive a new physics equation (as we saw with GPT-5.2's gluon scattering discovery).
- Optimize a logistics network in a way no human has thought of.
- Debug a complex distributed system by finding a novel race condition.
We are moving from "Artificial Intelligence" (mimicking human behavior) to "Automated Discovery" (generating new knowledge).
Visualization of a neural network exploring novel mathematical pathways.
The Reasoning Race: OpenAI vs. Google vs. DeepSeek
This announcement comes at a critical moment.
Just days ago, Google released Gemini 3 DeepThink, which topped the ARC-AGI benchmark. However, users quickly found that while DeepThink was impressive, it still hallucinated on complex, multi-step reasoning tasks.
OpenAI's result suggests they might have cracked a deeper level of reliability. By focusing on proof—where an answer is verifiable—they are pushing models to be rigorous rather than just persuasive.
Meanwhile, ByteDance has entered the fray with Seed 2.0 Pro, offering frontier-class reasoning at rock-bottom prices. The market is splitting: cheap, high-quality models for everyday tasks (ByteDance, DeepSeek) and specialized, reasoning-heavy models for breakthrough discovery (OpenAI, Google DeepMind).
What's Next?
The "First Proof" challenge is just the beginning. The solutions are currently being verified by the mathematical community. If they hold up, we will look back at this week as the moment AI officially became a research collaborator.
For businesses, the takeaway is clear: The capabilities of these models are accelerating, not plateauing.
If you are still using AI just to write emails, you are missing the point. The new generation of models can think, reason, and solve problems that you—and your competitors—haven't even figured out yet.
Is your business ready for the next level of AI? BaristaLabs helps companies move beyond basic chatbots to implement advanced reasoning workflows. Contact us today to learn how we can help you leverage the latest breakthroughs from OpenAI and beyond.