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HEP-TH and AI
Posted on August 16, 2026 by woit
I’ve been talking to people and seeing a lot of discussion about the effects of AI agents on math research, but haven’t found much serious discussion of what is happening in hep-th research. I’m curious to hear from those involved about exactly what is happening as researchers try and exploit these new tools.
Back in February I tried to generate some data about trends in hep-th submissions, initially got this wrong by using "recently modified", rather than "initial submission" dates. I’ve started playing with some AI agents, and one thing they’re good for is generating python scripts to gather and plot this kind of data. Here’s what hep-th submissions (not including cross-listings) look like for the past three months, compared to earlier years.
There’s a very clear pattern: the rate of hep-th submissions is now about 1/3 higher this year than in previous years.
I haven’t tried to count submissions acknowledging AI use, and from a quick look at the submissions, there are relatively few that explicitly advertise dependence on AI generated results.
One thing that is showing up is that, in hep-th as elsewhere, AI is being used to scam the public. A new press release from King’s College London announces that String theory finally testable with power of AI, which is based on this hep-th preprint, recently published in Phys. Rev. D. The press release includes:
Overturning decades of popular conjecture that theoretical string theory cannot be tested, scientists have robustly proved that it can be for the first time…
Author Dr David Marsh, Ernest Rutherford Fellow at King’s College London, said “The popular understanding that you can’t experimentally test string theory is no longer true. While previous studies have tested a few different models of string theory, our computational approach improves on this with rigorous testing across millions of different models.
“Rigorous falsification is the core of scientific experiment, and by finally applying this to string theory we finally have the tools to test this vaunted ‘theory of everything’. Finally touching experimentation here is an exciting step forward for theoretical particle physics.”
So, it’s clear that AI agents can produce hep-th papers designed to be promoted as outrageous bullshit, but I’m interested to hear about the opposite end of the credibility spectrum. What are examples of serious advances in the subject that are coming from AI tools?
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