Computers are extremely good with numbers, but they haven’t gotten many human mathematicians fired. Until recently, they could barely hold their own in high school-level math competitions. But now ...

Since the start of the 20th century, the heart of mathematics has been the proof — a rigorous, logical argument for whether a given statement is true or false. Mathematicians’ careers are measured by ...

Artificial intelligence has formally verified the prizewinning proof that solved the sphere packing problem in eight dimensions, a result closely tied to Maryna Viazovska’s Fields Medal. The ...

Math students may not blink at calculating probabilities, measuring the area beneath curves or evaluating matrices, yet they often find themselves at sea when first confronted with writing proofs. But ...

Number theorist Andrew Granville on what mathematics really is — and why objectivity is never quite within reach. In 2012, the mathematician Shinichi Mochizuki claimed he had solved the abc conjecture ...

All equals are not created equal—mathematicians sometimes play fast and loose. In programming, equal signs mean different things, and variables have different types. Turning intuitive math expertise ...

A few months before the 2025 International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO) in July, a three-person team at OpenAI made a long bet that they could use the competition’s brutally tough problems to train an ...

Mathematician Will Sawin discusses his experience reviewing and refining a mathematical proof devised by OpenAI's internal model—and what that could mean for mathematics. Reading time 10 minutes Will ...