SAIR launches Stage 1 of the Lean Kernel Challenge, a competition to improve verified computation performance in Lean 4 with eight problems spanning Fibonacci to SHA-256. Participants must develop algorithms and formally prove correctness in Lean, with submissions due November 20, 2026.
Terence Tao discusses his role as a public advocate for AI in mathematics, disclosing his affiliations with OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, and his co-founding of SAIR. He acknowledges the tension between promoting AI's potential while maintaining that real success rates on hard problems are only 1–2%, arguing that engagement with tech companies is more effective than uniform hostility and calling for broader grassroots debate among mathematicians rather than reliance on individual spokespeople.