Two weeks of discovery.
Thinking About Thinking is the founding official partner of DisCo, the Discovery Community. Our first joint programme opens today: a global scientific discovery competition, with a $15,000+ prize pool, run for a single founding cohort.
DisCo is a community for people interested in scientific discovery, reasoning and problem solving. Two Weeks of Discovery is the competition it opens with, hosted jointly by DisCo and Thinking About Thinking.
A prize pool for the founding cohort, awarded across overall performance, the hardest puzzles in the set, and the communities who enter together.
total prize pool · Wednesday 29 July to Wednesday 5 August
Closes end of day Wednesday 5 August
Play the first set of scientific discovery puzzles and compete alongside the other Founding Members of Cohort 001. You have been invited to join a hand-selected founding group of researchers, leading puzzle solvers and members of our partner communities.
Overall Performance · Individual
Achieve the highest combined score across all eligible puzzles. Your score on each puzzle is based on how efficiently you reach a verified solve. Every valid action counts, including actions taken across multiple attempts. The fewer total actions you take from beginning the puzzle to successfully solving it, the higher your score for that puzzle. Your scores across the full Round 1 puzzle set are weighted and combined to determine your overall ranking. Full scoring and tie-break rules are available in the competition terms. The overall winner is also invited to a closed session with Thinking About Thinking and participating sponsors at the AE Global Summit, and becomes a Discovery Fellow in Thinking About Thinking.
Overall Performance · Community
Awarded to the community with the strongest collective gameplay across all eligible puzzles. Scored on gameplay only. A community's score is the sum of its members' individual puzzle scores. Referrals, shares and chat activity do not count toward it. Full scoring and tie-break rules are available in the competition terms. A community must have at least 10 members with a verified solve to be eligible.
Single-Puzzle Awards
Win $200 for achieving the most efficient verified solution on each Genius Puzzle. Efficiency is determined by the fewest valid actions taken before solving the puzzle. Ties will be resolved according to the published competition rules. Each winner also becomes a Discovery Ambassador in Thinking About Thinking.
Community Builder Awards
Every Founding Member earns $200 for every 50 verified friends they refer to Cohort 001 during Round 1, and becomes a Discovery Ambassador in Thinking About Thinking.
Limited-Time Community Challenge
For a limited time, participating communities, societies and groups can unlock additional rewards for growing their Cohort 001 community. To complete the challenge, 20 members from the same community must each refer 20 verified friends who join and play. When the collective target is achieved, the community, society or group admins receive $500, and each of the 20 qualifying members who successfully referred receives $150 each. Verification requirements, eligibility periods and whether awards may be combined will be set out in the competition terms.
Content Award
Awarded to one member of the community who makes an inspiring piece of content this week. Educational, humorous or inspiring, it is yours to decide. One winner takes the $500. To enter, post it publicly, tag us, and use the hashtag #discoverycommunity. Find us on X at @disco_org, on LinkedIn as DisCo, the Discovery Community, and on Instagram at @discovery_community. Announced end of day Wednesday 12 August.
A private London experience for the winner
Following the competition, the top prize winner may be invited to a hosted lunch and office tour in London. Arrangements will be shared directly with the winner.
Performance prizes are determined solely by verified puzzle results at the discretion of DisCo’s team of judges. Referrals and social sharing do not affect puzzle rankings.
You can do either, or both. Everyone plays as an individual, and a community is something you belong to on top of that. It never changes how your own puzzles are scored.
Take part as an individual.
Apply on your own and play under your own call-sign. Your profile, your results and your own place on the leaderboard. You never need a community to take part, or to win a prize.
Read the player guide →Enter as a community.
A society, a lab, a study group or a few friends. Your community gets its own page, a private group chat and a referral link, and is ranked collectively on discovery performance, growth and participation.
Read the community partner guide →Apply and set up a profile.
Sign in with the email you applied on, choose a call-sign and add a photo. Cohort 001 is forming now, so early members set the baseline the rest is read against.
Play the Discovery Table.
Each puzzle is a small scientific world with a hidden system behind it. Nobody tells you the rules. You experiment, notice and infer, which is the loop a scientist runs, compressed into a puzzle.
Work within levels, lives and steps.
Every level gives you a limited number of steps. Run out and you lose a life. Some puzzles carry a Creative Mode where you can experiment without spending either.
Climb the leaderboard.
You are ranked on how efficiently you solve, measured in steps taken on your first attempt. The cohort board stays hidden until the competition closes.
The competition is two weeks. What comes out of it is meant to last longer than that.
Discovery Ambassador
Achieve on the Discovery Table, or grow the community around you, and you become a Discovery Ambassador in Thinking About Thinking.
Discovery Fellow
The top overall winner becomes a Discovery Fellow in Thinking About Thinking and joins a closed session with our team and sponsors at the AE Global Summit.
Verified certificates
Roles carry a verified certificate with a public verification link, for a CV, a portfolio or LinkedIn, alongside your DisCo record of real results.
Fellows and Ambassadors of Thinking About Thinking are welcome to enter as individuals, and societies and research groups are welcome to enter as communities and be scored together.
The first cohort is small on purpose. It sets the baseline against which the public benchmark competition will later be read, so the people in it are doing more than competing. They are establishing what a good performance looks like.
The societies and research bodies entering the first cohort alongside us.
You are early. That is the point.
Cohort 001 is forming now. Join, play, and bring the people who would enjoy this.
Fellows and Ambassadors
The people who carry this work into their own institutions and communities.
Read more →Our partnerships
The standing partnerships we keep with universities, societies and public-interest organisations.
Read more →AE Global Summit
Three days on the open problems of artificial intelligence, 25 to 27 November 2026.
Read more →