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Culture War Roundup for the week of October 5, 2026

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I believe one of the AI companies published a break in one of the post-quantum crypto finalists (HAWK). It wasn't the one NIST settled on, but I bet they looked at those. Note that NIST published crypto standards have at least once in the past been resistant to attacks not yet published when they were chosen.

But also, the P=NP Millenium Problem, which hasn't been claimed yet, would have very strong cryptography implications depending on the direction that goes.

But also, the P=NP Millenium Problem, which hasn't been claimed yet, would have very strong cryptography implications depending on the direction that goes.

If a constructive proof of P=NP is found, smart money would make an easy trillion+ dollars mining bitcoin and shorting the cryptocurrency markets (and all digital infrastructure stocks, for that matter) before claiming the piddling little Clay Millennium Prize.

That's for amateurs. I'd open a travelling salesmen route-planning company!

Depends on if the construction is galactic or not. We might have NP=P formally, but never be able to use it on any remotely practical problem. The world would mostly continue running as is.