More or Less

It’s said that AI could soon be coming for the jobs of artists, lawyers, and software engineers. But it might now also be threatening a role at the height of academia – are pure mathematicians safe?

Last month, a Stanford mathematician woke up to an email, claiming to have the solution to a problem he'd been working on for seven years - a fifty-year-old conundrum known as "Erdos Problem 1196".

The answer had been generated in just 80 minutes - by ChatGPT.

Since the end of last year, AI has been providing solutions to a number of novel maths problems, but Problem 1196 is the first to raise eyebrows within the mathematical community.

In this episode, we talk to the mathematicians who've worked on Problem 1196 and find out what the rise of AI could mean for the future of their field.


CONTRIBUTORS:
Katie Steckles, Mathematician and communicator
Jared Duker Lichtman, Szegő Assistant Professor of Mathematics at Stanford University
Liam Price, amateur mathematician

Credits:
Presenter: Charlotte McDonald
Producer: Josh McMinn
Series producer: Tom Colls
Production co-ordinator: Brenda Brown
Sound mix: Dave O'Neill
Editor: Richard Vadon

According to the World Health organisation, smoking kills some 7 million people every year. It is one of the world’s leading causes of preventable death.
Because smoking causes lung cancer and other awful health conditions, many smokers switch to vaping - using nicotine-based e-cigarettes.
But the World Health organisation is also concerned about vaping. Last year they said 100 million people around the world are now using e-cigarettes, including millions of children, and warned that they were fuelling a new wave of nicotine addiction.
But how do the health risks of these two means of getting nicotine into your bloodstream compare?
According to a recent headline in the Daily Mail, they’re basically the same. Here’s the headline:
“Vaping is linked to lung and mouth cancer in major study, as experts warn: 'It is NOT safer than smoking’”
But is vaping really just as bad for you as smoking?
CONTRIBUTOR:
Professor Lion Shahab, Co-Director of the UCL Tobacco and Alcohol Research Group
CREDITS:
Presenter: Charlotte McDonald
Reporter/producer: Tom Colls
Production co-ordinator: Brenda Brown
Sound mix: Dave O’Neil
Editor: Richard Vadon

If you spend much time on social media, and we don’t necessarily recommend it, then you’ve probably come across a strange fascination with water consumption.
Mainly, this is people telling you that using AI is terrible for the planet because of how much water it uses. We’ve already made a couple of programmes about the numbers in those arguments and, long story short, they probably aren’t saying what you think they’re saying.
But on platforms like X, BlueSky, and TikTok, an opportunity to keep an argument going is rarely missed

And one of the numbers that’s been enlisted in that glorious cause concerns the water that’s used for a seemingly unrelated past-time - eating beef. Here’s an example from a user on X:
“A kilogram of beef requires over 15,000 litres of water to produce,” they wrote. “A vegan who uses ChatGPT every day is living a more sustainable lifestyle than someone who regularly eats beef while boycotting AI.”
Ignoring the AI part, is that true? Does it actually take 15,000 litres of water to produce a kilogram of beef?

It turns out that the number isn’t wrong, but it probably isn’t saying what you think it’s saying.
If you’ve seen a number you think we should take a look at, email the More or Less team: [email protected]
CONTRIBUTORS:
Mesfin Mekonnen, Assistant Professor at the University of Alabama
Mark Mulligan, Professor of Physical and Environmental Geography at King's College London
Tim Hess, Professor of Water and Food Systems at Cranfield University

CREDITS:
Presenter: Charlotte McDonald
Producer: Mhairi MacKenzie
Series producer: Tom Colls
Production co-ordinator: Brenda Brown
Sound mix: Emma Harth
Editor: Richard Vadon

Vaccine policy in the US is something of an ideological battleground.
Health Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr is a vaccine sceptic, and since taking office he has attempted to remake US vaccine policy.
In March a judge blocked his proposal to cut the number of jabs that are recommended for kids.
At the same time, last year saw the worst measles outbreak in the US in decades. There were more than 2000 cases last year, and three people died. There have been more than 1500 cases so far in 2026.
There’s a lot going on, so it’s possible the public’s views on vaccination are shifting.
A new poll published by online news site Politico added a big claim into the mix. According to the headline “more Americans doubt vaccine safety than trust it”.
But is that what the survey actually found?
Dr David Higgins, a paediatrician and public health assistant professor who writes a Substack called Community Immunity, explains why he believes the headline is misleading.
If you've seen a number in the news you think we should take a look at, email [email protected]
Presenter: Charlotte McDonald
Series producer: Tom Colls
Production co-ordinator: Brenda Brown
Sound mix: Neil Churchill Editor:
Richard Vadon

US president Donald Trump is no fan of wind turbines, or windmills as he calls them.
Not only does he think they ruin the view from a golf course he owns in Scotland, but they are also deadly to birds.
“If you love birds, you’d never want to walk under a windmill,” he said in 2019.
“It’s a very sad, sad sight. It’s like a cemetery. We put a little statue for the poor birds.”
Earlier this year he posted on Truth Social saying that wind turbines were killing “millions” of birds.
But is that true? We speak to Dr Hannah Ritchie, Deputy Editor at Our World in Data and senior researcher at the University of Oxford, who has dug into the numbers on bird mortality and wind turbines.
Credits:
Presenter: Charlotte McDonald
Producer: Mhairi MacKenzie
Series producer: Tom Colls
Production co-ordinator: Brenda Brown
Sound mix: Sue Maillot
Editor: Richard Vadon