Scott Aaronson calls OpenAI’s conduct arguably “unsportsmanlike” while rejecting the chat-log claim
Scott AaronsonTheoretical computer scientist, writing on his personal blog Shtetl-Optimized
Scott Aaronson wrote that he would not adjudicate the dispute, characterised OpenAI’s decision to commit far greater resources once it learned of progress as arguably “unsportsmanlike,” rejected as implausible the claim that its models benefited from the mathematicians’ chat logs, and said the question of what OpenAI knew and when remained unanswered.
“My purpose here is not to adjudicate the dispute. Yes, in swooping in with vastly greater resources once it had gotten wind of progress on Navier-Stokes, OpenAI seems to have acted in a way that some might describe as “unsportsmanlike.” No, I don’t find it plausible that OpenAI’s models meaningfully benefitted from being trained on Buckmaster and Alpöge’s chat logs.”
Analysis
Where this statement fits
Did OpenAI improperly pressure mathematicians over authorship and credit?
Tristan Buckmaster describes pressure over authorship and publication during discussions about competing AI-assisted mathematics results. Sébastien Bubeck disputes that characterization and says the proposed authorship concerned OpenAI's own proof. His apology for career-related wording does not settle the disagreement. Researchers and commentators divide over whether the negotiations were appropriate, while raising a separate dispute about the treatment of unpublished user research.
Source and context
Analysis
About this source
Post by a theoretical computer scientist who links both Buckmaster’s statement and Bubeck’s LinkedIn response before separating the two halves of the dispute: he criticises OpenAI’s conduct while rejecting the training-data claim, and leaves open “what exactly did OpenAI know about Buckmaster and Alpöge’s work and when did it know it?”
Before the quotation
Written in a wide-ranging post on AI progress that links both Buckmaster’s statement and Bubeck’s LinkedIn response, and notes the agreed point that all the work built on an approach pioneered by Diego Córdoba and Luis Martínez-Zoroa.
After the quotation
Aaronson immediately adds the question he regards as unresolved: “what exactly did OpenAI know about Buckmaster and Alpöge’s work and when did it know it?” His rejection of the chat-log claim predates OpenAI’s more specific July 3 cutoff statement reported two days later.
How this statement is classified
The label describes this statement's response within the context above.
Why this label?
On Aaronson splits the dispute along its two halves and lands on opposite sides of each: he is critical of OpenAI’s conduct in moving on the problem once it learned of progress, and dismissive of the separate allegation that user chat logs materially fed its models. He also expressly declines to adjudicate and leaves the central factual question open. That is a substantive conflict about the relevant matter, not a qualification of a single conclusion, which is what distinguishes it from “Condemned” on the one hand and “Challenged the characterization” on the other.
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- Scott Aaronson calls OpenAI’s conduct arguably “unsportsmanlike” while rejecting the chat-log claim
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The Dispute Index. "Scott Aaronson calls OpenAI’s conduct arguably “unsportsmanlike” while rejecting the chat-log claim". First published: 2026-09-18. Last updated: 2026-09-22. https://disputeindex.com/events/1070-scott-aaronson-wrote-that-he-would-not-adjudicate