Science Markets
Markets / Earth sciences / Core mineral physics

One iron crystal structure beats another at a fixed pressure and temperature.

Which of two iron crystal structures has lower free energy at 330 gigapascals and 6000 kelvin? This does not claim either structure is more stable than liquid iron.

Open
Trading paused. You can read the definition and evidence, but new trading is not available here. Pool links or recorded prices do not establish live access.

Price history

No recorded prices yet. Trading prices appear once pools are live.

The single AI dot opens that round's saved record.

How to read this chart

Each dot is one recorded reading, thinned to hourly for readability; the underlying samples are every few minutes. The line between two dots is not a measurement. How the AI estimate is made.

Weekly AI estimate

20% This week · Nov 10, 2026 09:33 PM EST

The average of three models reading the same evidence. It is an estimate, not proof the hypothesis holds, and it does not set the pool price.

Range
16–25%
Verdict
Undecided

The panel's confident binary this round Undecided the models did not all agree

0% 25% 50% 75% 100%
OpenAI 25% Anthropic 20% xAI 16% Average 20%
Market definition · YES, NO and evidence rules

This is the frozen contract wording. Read the YES and NO tests, the evidence requirements and the undecided cases before taking a position.

Canonical title

Pure iron favours bcc over hcp at 330 GPa and 6000 K.

Exact hypothesis · technical wording

For isotopically natural pure iron at 330 gigapascals and 6000 kelvin, G_bcc-G_hcp < 0 per atom, with both solids constrained to their crystalline basins and Gibbs free energies including electronic and anharmonic nuclear contributions. This compares two phases at a fixed thermodynamic state; it does not assert that either beats liquid or that Earth's alloyed inner core is bcc. The fixed state is a contract convention.

Each round reads the evidence that was public at a stated cutoff. Later evidence goes into a later round; the market itself has no expiry date.

How the evidence cutoff is fixed

A round only counts evidence published before its own cutoff time, and the round's number is that timestamp. So a round cannot borrow a later cutoff, and an earlier round's judgment cannot be reused for a later one. The hypothesis wording, the resolution criteria and the methodology identifier were hashed into the market account at creation, which is what stops any of them being edited afterwards.

Resolution criteria

YES: Independent first-principles free-energy calculations, independently implemented and checked against high-pressure experimental constraints, each have a 95% uncertainty interval for G_bcc-G_hcp wholly below zero, including finite-size, sampling and electronic-structure error. NO: The same eligible calculations each have a 95% interval wholly >= zero. A phase unstable within its constrained basin, unresolved systematic error, a different pressure/temperature, or alloy stabilization leaves this comparison UNDECIDED. Reference sources: Finite-temperature crystal structure prediction (https://www.nature.com/articles/s41524-023-01120-6); bcc iron stability proposal (https://www.nature.com/articles/nature01954). Evidence policy: use public primary research with methods and uncertainty, plus the named reference sources below. A preprint can inform the estimate but cannot alone meet a terminal criterion; require a peer-reviewed primary result and an independent reproduction using non-overlapping observations or independently prepared samples, unless this is a mathematical proof or the specific criterion instead requires independently implemented calculations. Report data provenance, exclusions, calibration, statistical model and systematic uncertainty. Independence means different data acquisition, not two papers reanalysing the same sample. For a quantitative terminal test, both independent results must meet the stated threshold; disagreement or an interval crossing the boundary means UNDECIDED. Use the final corrected version public at the signed round's evidence cutoff (UTC); exclude later evidence until a later eligible round. Every report in a terminal round must use the same cutoff, covered by the verified signed context and enforced by the configured terminal protocol; a different cutoff requires a new eligible round, never reinterpretation of a signed report or mutation of an immutable binding. This market has no calendar expiry. Retracted findings cannot supply a terminal result. If a named source disappears, use its DOI/publisher or an archived identical version, then an equivalent primary publication applying these unchanged definitions; if none is accessible, remain UNDECIDED, never substitute a different test. Missing data, failed replication, a null search outside the specified domain, or an untested alternative is not automatically NO. These are instructions for evidence assessment, not an automatic truth oracle: scientific interpretation and systematic-error judgment remain. Settlement follows the configured platform mode: terminal mode requires one valid round with all three frozen models returning the same explicit YES or NO and criterion_met=true; any UNDECIDED, failure or disagreement leaves it unresolved. Legacy proposal/challenge mode requires its recorded review process. Model agreement does not prove scientific truth. Invalidity is not NO and this text does not authorize a refund or cancellation: only a cancellation rule disclosed before exposure, if the configured contract supports it, can apply. Otherwise pause new entries and preserve holders' existing rights. Never reinterpret terms after listing.

The definition does not change when an AI estimate changes. Read the listing policy and this market's settlement status.

How each model argued

Three models read the same evidence and did not fully agree. Their average is 0.20.

This round ran under methodology panel-v9. Short excerpts are below; the round 5 page keeps the full answers, sources and raw responses. The current methodology and example requests do not reconstruct this historical round's exact request.

OpenAI UNDECIDED 0.25

openai/gpt-6.1-sol

The retrieved calculations favor hcp, lowering my support for the proposed negative free-energy difference. However, the exact-state 2023 calculation lets bcc transform rather than measuring its constrained-basin free energy, while the…

Would change this view: Independent exact-state calculations with fully budgeted 95% intervals below zero would reverse my assessment; intervals wholly nonnegative would support a definite contrary verdict.

Full explanation from OpenAI→
Anthropic UNDECIDED 0.20

anthropic/claude-sonnet-5.5

Published first-principles results disagree on the bcc–hcp ordering of iron near inner-core conditions. Belonoshko and co-workers favour bcc, while most free-energy studies and the named crystal-structure-prediction paper favour hcp. I…

Would change this view: Several independently implemented anharmonic free-energy calculations at 330 GPa and 6000 K with full error bars all giving bcc lower (raising the estimate) or all giving hcp lower (lowering it).

Full explanation from Anthropic→
xAI UNDECIDED 0.16

x-ai/grok-4.7

At the stated state point, the peer-reviewed T-USPEX/PBE calculation finds a bcc seed relaxes to hcp, so bcc is not stable in its crystalline basin and no constrained G_bcc-G_hcp 95% interval wholly below zero exists. Older MD favoring bcc…

Would change this view: Two independent peer-reviewed calculations with 95% intervals for constrained G_bcc-G_hcp at 330 GPa and 6000 K wholly below zero.

Full explanation from xAI→

What moved the number

—
Oct 16

This is a new contract, not a migrated position or a continuation of old forecast history. The initial 0.50 is an initialization convention, not an AI forecast or an assessed scientific probability. Reference links are background sources,…

Nov 10
0.13 0.20 +7.3

OpenAI estimated 0.25. The retrieved calculations favor hcp, lowering my support for the proposed negative free-energy difference. However, the exact-state 2023 calculation lets bcc transform rather than measuring its constrained-basin…

This round's saved score, answers and sources →
Nov 9
0.13 0.13 0.0 no model output

Live panel did not return all three estimates (OpenAI, Anthropic, xAI failed or gave an unusable answer). A round is only live when all three are valid, so this round is a placeholder at the previous score rather than an average of two.

This round's saved score, answers and sources →
Oct 19

OpenAI estimated 0.25. I interpret this as the constrained-solid free-energy difference, not stability against melting. Retrieved calculations favor hcp, but the exact-state structure search instead loses the bcc basin, which explicitly……

This round's saved score, answers and sources →
—
Oct 19

AI estimate scheduled: an independent three-model panel reads the published definition and evidence every week. New positions are still closed for this market, so the estimate is here to read, not to trade against.

The evidence packet · 5 entries

What the panel was shown when this round ran. A row with no source link is a description only, and the panel is told so.

Finite-temperature crystal structure prediction

Context

Predicts hcp stability at specified states within a stated electronic-structure approximation; impurities may alter stability.

Source link

bcc iron stability proposal

Context

Earlier molecular-dynamics result supporting bcc; illustrates model-dependent disagreement.

Source link

Required positive observation

Supporting

Independent first-principles free-energy calculations, independently implemented and checked against high-pressure experimental constraints, each have a 95% uncertainty interval for G_bcc-G_hcp wholly below zero, including finite-size, sampling and electronic-structure error.

Description only · no source link recorded

Required contrary observation

Contrary

The same eligible calculations each have a 95% interval wholly >= zero. A phase unstable within its constrained basin, unresolved systematic error, a different pressure/temperature, or alloy stabilization leaves this comparison UNDECIDED.

Description only · no source link recorded

Eligibility and unresolved outcomes

Method

Evidence policy: use public primary research with methods and uncertainty, plus the named reference sources below. A preprint can inform the estimate but cannot alone meet a terminal criterion; require a peer-reviewed primary result and an independent reproduction using non-overlapping observations or independently prepared samples, unless this is a mathematical proof or the specific criterion instead requires independently implemented calculations. Report data provenance, exclusions, calibration, statistical model and systematic uncertainty. Independence means different data acquisition, not two papers reanalysing the same sample. For a quantitative terminal test, both independent results must meet the stated threshold; disagreement or an interval crossing the boundary means UNDECIDED. Use the final corrected version public at the signed round's evidence cutoff (UTC); exclude later evidence until a later eligible round. Every report in a terminal round must use the same cutoff, covered by the verified signed context and enforced by the configured terminal protocol; a different cutoff requires a new eligible round, never reinterpretation of a signed report or mutation of an immutable binding. This market has no calendar expiry. Retracted findings cannot supply a terminal result. If a named source disappears, use its DOI/publisher or an archived identical version, then an equivalent primary publication applying these unchanged definitions; if none is accessible, remain UNDECIDED, never substitute a different test. Missing data, failed replication, a null search outside the specified domain, or an untested alternative is not automatically NO. These are instructions for evidence assessment, not an automatic truth oracle: scientific interpretation and systematic-error judgment remain. Settlement follows the configured platform mode: terminal mode requires one valid round with all three frozen models returning the same explicit YES or NO and criterion_met=true; any UNDECIDED, failure or disagreement leaves it unresolved. Legacy proposal/challenge mode requires its recorded review process. Model agreement does not prove scientific truth. Invalidity is not NO and this text does not authorize a refund or cancellation: only a cancellation rule disclosed before exposure, if the configured contract supports it, can apply. Otherwise pause new entries and preserve holders' existing rights. Never reinterpret terms after listing.

Description only · no source link recorded

Past estimates

Every weekly estimate, newest first
DateEstimateRange
Nov 10, 2026 09:33 PM EST 20% 16–25%
Nov 09, 2026 09:18 AM EST 13% no live reading
Nov 02, 2026 09:18 AM EST 13% no live reading
Oct 26, 2026 10:18 AM EDT 13% no live reading
Oct 19, 2026 07:02 PM EDT 13% 4–25%

Discussion

Start a thread

No threads yet. Argue about the evidence, the panel, or whether the hypothesis is worded fairly.

Anyone can join the discussion. Sign in with a wallet to keep your threads together.