On September 8th, 2026, Open AI announced an AI-generated solution to the Navier–Stokes existence and smoothness problem, one of the seven Millennium Prize Problems. The announcement sparked debate over credit allocation between humans and machines, with Tristan Buckmaster calling it a "Deep Blue–Kasparov moment." Existential questions arose about whether mathematics is on the verge of being "solved" like chess and Go.

The narrative that AI has "solved" mathematics rests on two flawed assumptions: that AI truly solved a mathematical problem, and that mathematics is only about solving problems. Providing a mere answer—even if formally certified—is insufficient without an intelligible proof human mathematicians can understand and build upon.

Mathematics is far broader than problem solving. Mathematicians develop new concepts, ask novel questions, unify areas, educate communities, and create work valued for beauty and depth. Rather than retreating to "keep playing," we should reject characterizing mathematics as a game and instead examine what mathematics really is and what we want it to be.

Open AI produced an answer—yes, Navier–Stokes can develop a singularity—along with a Lean formalization and informal manuscript. While more than Deep Thought's "42," it remains unsatisfying because proof itself has multiple notions, and the underlying understanding remains incomplete.