Do not judge mathematicians for their LLM use. The standards of our community are still in flux. We can fight over what those standards should be, but individuals have to act in the meantime and we should not litigate their behavior.Which is calling on good behavior by people who may or may not choose to listen to Terry.
LLMs should not be used to compete with other mathematicians, to scoop them or otherwise embarrass them. It goes without saying that we are somewhat competitive, but there is nothing to be gained from this behavior and a lot to lose in terms of collegiality. We are extremely lucky to be in a field where we talk openly at conferences not only about what we’ve done but what we are working on, sometimes years before those results see the light of day.
Focus, if you choose to use LLMs, on developing your own research, intuition, and results. No one owns an area of mathematics or a certain problem. But it is not acceptable for me to wake up one day and say, you know I know famous mathematician — is working on problem — and I’m just going to solve it. They will be impressed with me, or I will get that next job I need. The easiest way to guard against this behavior in the long run is to just not reward it.