P vs NP : can creativity be automated?

It looks like that I have a tendency to be reading/thinking of what could become news later. I have been blogging enough about P, Post-p etc and it is not ironical that P vs NP problem is in the news. Not only had I posted on my hit at NP-completeness, but I followed it up with my observations on Cook-Levin.

It is no wonder that the million dollar maths puzzle sparks row

Vinay Deolalikar, a mathematician based at Hewlett-Packard laboratories in California, US, claims to have solved the problem of P vs NP.

The skepticism has already started with

Dr Aaronson says the new proof may fail a "very simple sanity check"

It is not really surprising because the consequences of this is also philosophical. In other words

"P vs NP is asking - can creativity be automated?"
Dr Deolalikar claims that his proof shows that it cannot.

Though it may sound 'natural' to many that P is different from NP, it is like this Sudoku analogy. What is a 'hard Sudoku'? For a greenhorn, even medium Sudoku can be 'hard'. I remember doing the last two 'hard' Sudokus in Hindu successfully. It is not necessarily because I am intelligent but I think it is more because I am used to it and my 'Sudoku thinking' skills are reasonably honed by now. As a DFT mercenary, I did mention

there is nothing new or great that is going to shake my domain.

Switching to other domains, Ian Chappell said similarly about the problems with ODI cricket

part of the problem with 50-over cricket is that it is becoming very formulaic

I am sure the other art forms started on similar trend long back. Hollywood was ridiculously formulaic, Bollywood or Hindi Cinema followed suit to its nadir and there were/are some directors in Tamil who involve in such exercise, indulging in a harakiri. I remember one director saying that there is no 'new story' as there are only 5 stories. The director has to just change the rendition. In music, Ilayaraja demonstrated the farce of 'creation' or rather 'making' mode of music at a 'music factory' - he has said many times that music is nothing but a deception that a new thing has been created ;)


I do tend to think that in line with other domains, P may end up getting equalized with NP and proven so. It is poetic, rather mathematical justice ;) Creativity can indeed be automated.