Story
Further human + AI + proof assistant work on Knuth's "Claude Cycles" problem
1 report
1 website
1 discussion
Latest report
Overview
Claude found an odd-m construction for the open Hamiltonian decomposition problem, impressing Prof. Donald Knuth, who titled the resulting paper "Claude’s Cycles." The updated research reveals that for the base case m=3, there are 11,502 Hamiltonian cycles, with 996 generalizing to all odd-m, and 760 valid "Claude-like" decompositions identified.
Summary from twitter.com.
Reports
One report so far. Additional coverage will appear here when it is linked to this story.
Community reactions
Each reaction summarizes sampled comments from the linked discussion.
Hacker News · twitter.com
Hacker News discussion ↗
Historical count: 5 · 5 saved in sample · Historical sample
Analysis ready
Read this discussion’s reaction
Based on 5 sampled comments from this thread. Analyzed 2026-03-29.
- Praise: AI's ability to discover new mathematical concepts highlights its potential in advancing fields like mathematics, which could lead to groundbreaking discoveries.
- Praise: The idea of using AlphaGo-style reinforcement learning on Lean syntax trees suggests a promising direction for AI's capability to tackle complex mathematical problems over longer timescales.
- Concern: The comment about AI winning a Fields Medal before managing a McDonald's reflects skepticism about AI's practical applications in everyday tasks, indicating a gap between theoretical and practical capabilities.