AI ResearchJul 15, 2026, 5:35 PM

GPT-5.6 Sol reportedly disproves a 30-year-old statistics conjecture in 90 minutes after humans couldn't crack it

30-second summary

A University of Pennsylvania professor utilized OpenAI's GPT-5.6 Sol Pro to solve a 30-year-old statistics conjecture in 90 minutes, a task that eluded human mathematicians for decades. The predecessor model, GPT-5.5, failed to find the solution even after 20 hours of processing.

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GPT-5.6 Sol reportedly disproves a 30-year-old statistics conjecture in 90 minutes after humans couldn't crack it
Key takeaways
  • GPT-5.6 Sol Pro solved a 30-year-old statistics conjecture in 90 minutes.
  • The same conjecture could not be solved by GPT-5.5 in 20 hours.
  • The AI's solution combines known methods in a novel way.
  • This event sparks debate on AI's ability to create genuinely new knowledge.
Full story

A significant statistical problem, a conjecture related to the Benjamini-Hochberg method, has reportedly been solved using OpenAI's GPT-5.6 Sol Pro. The AI model achieved this breakthrough in approximately 90 minutes, a feat that had stumped human researchers for three decades. Notably, the previous iteration of the model, GPT-5.5, was unable to find a solution even after 20 hours of computation.

This development raises intriguing questions about the nature of AI's capabilities. While the solution appears to be a novel combination of existing methods, it prompts a deeper discussion on whether AI can generate truly new knowledge or if its contributions are limited to sophisticated recombination of its training data.

Why this matters
Developers

Demonstrates advanced reasoning and problem-solving capabilities in LLMs.

Businesses

Highlights potential for AI to accelerate scientific discovery and innovation.

Investors

Suggests continued rapid advancement and potential for disruptive AI applications.

Students

Illustrates AI's growing role in academic research and complex problem-solving.

Everyone

Raises philosophical questions about the nature of intelligence and discovery.

Glossary
Benjamini-Hochberg method
A statistical procedure used for controlling the false discovery rate when performing multiple hypothesis tests.
conjecture
A statement or proposition which is accepted as true until proved otherwise.
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