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Being scooped is not a new phenomenon, but the scooper's story is almost always that they were working on the problem independently or had some independent insight into it. By OpenAI's own account, they were inspired to start working on this by rumors that there might be Millennium Prize solutions to scoop.

by fooker15 hours ago|

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Research projects don't start in a vacuum.

It never happens that you wake up one morning and start working on a new problem that came to you in a dream (*unless you are Ramanujan).

This is business as usual for academia, it's amusing to the discussion over it.

by rf_physics13 hours ago|

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Apologies if this is against the rules, but could I ask if you have some background in scientific research (maybe you could elaborate lightly on topics you've worked on)?

From my perspective, this practice is quite bad mannered, unusual, and heavily frowned upon, but I recognize it's possible that these stories might be more common in other fields. Still, I'd appreciate a strong sign that you aren't making these statements up based on secondhand accounts of what 'academia is usually like'.

by fooker11 hours ago|

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CS PhD, used to be a professor, have worked at several industry research labs since.

> this practice is quite bad mannered, unusual, and heavily frowned upon,

Yes, it is.

Maybe you missed my point?

The fact that is "quite bad mannered, unusual, and heavily frowned upon" does not stop it from happening, and it is common for all high profile inventions and discoveries.

This does not disqualify the person doing the scooping, history remembers them as having the credit, and quietly forgets the person who was scooped.

by rf_physics7 hours ago|

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My initial read of this

> Pretty much all of math and science history is basically this pattern again and again. I'm sure all of that was rude as well.

was that you were trying to suggest that it wasn't. It seems we actually share similar views here then? I cannot say anything about how common it is, since I've been pretty lucky when collaborating I guess.

by fooker5 hours ago|

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I meant that it's very common when it comes to high profile discoveries and inventions.

If you have made one, and there was never any dishonest competition, you have indeed been very lucky.

I haven't, but the history of science is rather nasty.

by SpicyLemonZest14 hours ago|

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If it's all business as usual and being scooped is no big deal, why was OpenAI in such a rush? They didn't have to launch this effort on the very day they heard the rumor, run "on the order of 10,000 concurrent agents", or try to coordinate announcement scheduling with Buckmaster in the middle of a long weekend. It seems to me that they understood very well this was not a "business as usual" announcement, and devoted huge amounts of money and focus to maximize the chance that they were first.

by fooker14 hours ago|

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I think you're making the opposite conclusion than what I intended?

Being scooped is a big deal for the one getting scooped.

It has never been a big deal for the one doing the scooping. History is full of math and science results being scooped. For example, we keep calling it Pythagoras' theorem a few thousand years later.