Hey neighbor,
Big week for things that affect your everyday life. The new Siri just launched on iPhones. OpenAI released GPT-6. And driverless taxis are about to roll through Tokyo. Let's get into it.
THIS WEEK IN AI
The new Siri just launched — and it's powered by Google
Apple opened the English public beta of its rebuilt Siri AI, powered by models custom-built with Google and Gemini. Processing is split between devices and Apple's Private Cloud Compute. More languages are due next month, but the launch excludes the EU on several platforms and remains on hold in China. AI Weekly
In plain English: if you have an iPhone, the Siri you've been complaining about for years just got a major upgrade. The new version is powered by Google's Gemini technology — which means it's now in the same league as ChatGPT and Claude for everyday conversations and tasks.
What this means for you: update your iPhone this week and try Siri again. Ask it something you would normally open ChatGPT for — help drafting a message, understanding something confusing, planning something. You might be pleasantly surprised. The old Siri is gone.
OpenAI launched GPT-6 — and it used 10,000 AI agents to help prove a math theorem
OpenAI used roughly 10,000 agents, 2.7 million messages, and 130 billion output tokens to produce a proposed Navier-Stokes proof — one of the most famous unsolved problems in mathematics — as part of the GPT-6 launch this week. AI-Weekly
Here's what that means in plain English. Navier-Stokes equations describe how fluids move — water, air, blood. Solving them is one of the seven Millennium Prize Problems, each worth $1 million. OpenAI didn't just launch a new model this week — it aimed its new model at one of the hardest math problems in human history.
Whether the proof holds up under scrutiny from mathematicians is still being debated. But the ambition alone is remarkable. A year ago AI was helping you write emails. This week it's attempting $1 million math problems.
Waymo is bringing driverless taxis to Tokyo
Waymo maps driverless taxis onto Tokyo — marking the first time the company has expanded its fully autonomous ride service outside the United States. Tech Startups
Tokyo is one of the most complex driving environments in the world — narrow streets, dense traffic, precise rules, and millions of pedestrians. If Waymo can operate there autonomously, it can operate almost anywhere.
What this means for you: fully autonomous vehicles are no longer just a San Francisco story. They're going global. Within a few years driverless taxis will be operating in major cities around the world — and eventually, in cities near you.
PLAIN ENGLISH EXPLAINER
What is Navier-Stokes — and why does it matter that AI is trying to solve it?
The Navier-Stokes equations are a set of mathematical formulas that describe how fluids — water, air, blood, weather systems — flow and behave. They were written down in the 1800s and are used in everything from airplane design to climate modeling to understanding how your heart pumps blood.
The problem: while we can use these equations to make predictions, mathematicians have never been able to prove that they always produce smooth, well-behaved solutions — or whether they sometimes break down. That gap between "works in practice" and "proven in theory" has stumped the world's best mathematicians for over 150 years.
It's one of seven Millennium Prize Problems — each carrying a $1 million reward. Only one has ever been solved by a human.
OpenAI aimed GPT-6 at this problem this week. Whether its proposed proof is correct is still being evaluated. But the fact that an AI is making serious attempts at a 150-year-old $1 million math problem tells you something important about where AI capability is heading.
TOOL OF THE WEEK
Try this: The new Siri on your iPhone — it's actually good now
Apple announced the $399 Watch Series 12 with Audio Intelligence, a Siri-powered set of ambient-listening features. Live Rewind can display a transcript of the previous 15 seconds after a Digital Crown double-press, while Siri Recap summarizes conversations. AI-Weekly
But the biggest Siri upgrade is on iPhone. Here are three things to try this week:
→ Ask Siri to help you draft a reply to a message — describe what you want to say and let it write a first draft
→ Ask it to summarize what's on your calendar this week and suggest anything you should prepare for
→ Ask it a genuinely complex question — something you'd normally Google — and see how the new version compares to the old one
If you gave up on Siri years ago, give it one more try this week. The bar just moved significantly.
NEIGHBOR'S THOUGHT
The week AI went everywhere at once
New Siri on your iPhone. GPT-6 attempting $1 million math problems. Driverless taxis in Tokyo. Claude writing 80% of Anthropic's own code.
Every week the stories seem bigger than the week before. And every week I find myself thinking about the same question: what does it mean to be a person in a world where AI is doing more and more of what we used to think only people could do?
I don't have a complete answer. But I think the beginning of an answer is staying informed — which you're doing. And staying curious — which, if you're reading this, you already are.
The world is changing fast. You're keeping up. That matters.
UNTIL NEXT WEEK
That's your week in AI — Issue #23. Nearly six months of plain-English AI news, every Thursday.
If this newsletter helps you feel informed rather than overwhelmed, share it with one person this week. That's how we grow — one neighbor at a time.
See you next Thursday. ☀️
— The AI Neighbor Team
theaineighbor.com