As Math Grows More Complex, Will Computers Reign?

Natalie Wolchover:

Shalosh B. Ekhad, the co-author of several papers in respected mathematics journals, has been known to prove with a single, succinct utterance theorems and identities that previously required pages of mathematical reasoning. Last year, when asked to evaluate a formula for the number of integer triangles with a given perimeter, Ekhad performed 37 calculations in less than a second and delivered the verdict: "True."

Shalosh B. Ekhad is a computer. Or, rather, it is any of a rotating cast of computers used by the mathematician Doron Zeilberger, from the Dell in his New Jersey office to a supercomputer whose services he occasionally enlists in Austria. The name -- Hebrew for "three B one" -- refers to the AT&T 3B1, Ekhad's earliest incarnation.

"The soul is the software," said Zeilberger, who writes his own code using a popular math programming tool called Maple.

A mustachioed, 62-year-old professor at Rutgers University, Zeilberger anchors one end of a spectrum of opinions about the role of computers in mathematics. He has been listing Ekhad as a co-author on papers since the late 1980s "to make a statement that computers should get credit where credit is due." For decades, he has railed against "human-centric bigotry" by mathematicians: a preference for pencil-and-paper proofs that Zeilberger claims has stymied progress in the field. "For good reason," he said. "People feel they will be out of business."

Posted by Jim Zellmer at March 6, 2013 2:46 AM
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