Theme

Discovery becomes industrial process

Explore this theme’s evidence over time →

Sources

Attribution and reporting linked by this record; links do not imply independent verification.

Welcome to December 17, 2025 (theinnermostloop.substack.com)

Not merely automated but demystified: results arrive on a schedule, and the awe attached to them converts into technical respect. The newsletter treats the loss of wonder as the real signal.

Development timeline

Newest reporting dates first. Reporting dates may differ from event dates.

2026-09-17: Discovery replay reduces live agent calls

2026-09-13: A new benchmark targets autonomous open-ended invention

2026-08-16: An auto-research loop finds a 232-fold kernel speedup

2026-07-23: Researchers propose learnable novelty as a measure of intelligence

2026-07-05: A framework finds machine research ideas cluster where humans roam

2026-06-27: A diffusion model rediscovers a fast-food staple then improves on it

2026-06-17: A near-autonomous AI chemist runs 10,080 experiments and finds the trick

2026-06-05: A model learns to abandon dead ends better than its researchers

2026-05-29: Humans disprove a conjecture using methods lifted from an AI proof

2026-05-21: A general-purpose model disproves Erdős's unit distance conjecture

2026-05-17: A model replaying slices of the web occasionally beats a prediction market

2026-05-04: Number theorists call machine proofs elegant and original

2026-05-03: A national lab replicates a condensed-matter paper with agents

2026-04-29: A model finds a programmable DNA-targeting system that predates CRISPR

2026-04-16: A mathematician calls a machine proof one from The Book

2026-04-09: Five more Erdős problems close across three fields

2026-04-05: A compound in python blood suppresses appetite without nausea

2026-04-01: Three more Erdős problems fall to an internal model

2026-03-24: A conjecture from 2019 is settled and its author approves

2026-03-23: Reinforcement learning improves forecasting of world events

2026-03-22: An agent generates 665 novel research problems in differential geometry

2026-03-06: A model begins making novel observations where none had scored

2026-03-04: Weight-loss drugs work better on alternate weeks

2026-03-03: Gauss formalizes a Fields Medal proof and finds two errors in it

2026-02-23: Bacteria from 5,000-year-old ice fight drug-resistant pathogens

2026-02-16: A model conjectures a gluon formula and then proves it

2026-02-10: A startup mines parasite biology for autoimmune therapy

2026-02-03: DeepMind bulk-solves thirteen Erdős problems

2026-01-29: A cancer protein breaks apart Alzheimer's plaques

2026-01-27: Hobbyists attempt all 675 open Erdős problems at once

2026-01-15: A model finds in five minutes a Bellman function sought for years

2026-01-14: The AMS president proves a result he is unsure he could reach alone

2026-01-13: Tao says he learned something from the machine

2026-01-12: A hobbyist reverse-engineers Coca-Cola

2026-01-11: Erdős #729 falls, the second in a week

2026-01-10: DrugCLIP screens ten million times faster than docking

2026-01-08: Math, Inc. autoformalizes a web of Tao's estimates

2026-01-07: An Erdős problem is solved before any human solves it

2026-01-07: An 8B model reaches SOTA forecasting by predicting its own future

2026-01-04: Bacterial persistence splits into two archetypes

2026-01-03: A failed trial reframes Alzheimer's as metabolic

2026-01-01: Adobe formalizes discovering concepts from raw experience

2025-12-29: Tao opens a ledger on AI's Erdős contributions

2025-12-27: A math agent solves Erdős #897 with no human input

2025-12-22: Researchers using LLMs post up to 50% more preprints

2025-12-21: A former DeepMind director bets $10,000 on solving Navier-Stokes

2025-12-20: Seed-Prover 1.5 solves 11 of 12 Putnam problems

2025-12-18: A mathematician solves his own open problem with GPT-5 and colour-codes authorship

2025-12-17: GPT-5 directs a wet lab to a 79x better cloning protocol

2025-12-17: Quilter compresses a quarterly board design into under a week

2025-12-17: Tao compares AI-driven proof to a magic trick explained

Knowledge graphopen in browser →

Cite or correct this record

Citation formatCitation text

Discovery becomes industrial process
Innermost Loop KB — secondary record
Reporting date: unknown
KB permalink: https://nicholsn.github.io/innermost-loop-kb/themes/discovery-as-process
Attributed sources:
- Welcome to December 17, 2025 — https://theinnermostloop.substack.com/p/welcome-to-december-17-2025
This citation does not imply independent verification of linked-source claims.

Suggest a correction — opens a GitHub draft for you to review and submit.