OpenAI and Anthropic Challenge 27-Year Hypothesis — Ai Impacts Theoretical Computer Science

OpenAI and Anthropic said this week that AI impacts theoretical computer science by disproving the exponential time hypothesis, a claim that cuts into a foundation used across complexity and algorithm design. If the result holds, work built on that assumption may need major revision rather than minor correction. Peter Jonsson, a Linköping University professor, said much of his work was “dead” after AI showed that a 27-year-old hypothesis underpinning it is wrong. He said, “but at the same time, we learn a lot from it. And this is what science is about.” OpenAI posted the proofs on GitHub in natural language and in Lean format, which gives researchers two ways to inspect the same argument: one for reading and one for machine checking.