Is Math Invented or Discovered? | Scientific Controversies

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“The enormous usefulness of mathematics in the natural sciences is something bordering on the mysterious… there is no rational explanation for it,” wrote Nobel Laureate Eugene Wigner. There are mathematical descriptions of natural phenomena on all scales: Fibonacci series in flowers, logarithmic spirals in snails, fractals in mountain ranges, parabolas in home runs, and pi in the spherical shape of stars, planets, and bubbles. But is math discovered in nature or is it invented by humans and imposed on an agnostic reality? Will mathematics always be able to unlock the mysteries of the universe, or will we come to an end of its utility?

Join our Director of Sciences Janna Levin as she hosts our guests Rafael Nuñez and Max Tegmark in a conversation to challenge our beliefs on mathematics—discovered or invented—and to question if mathematics does in fact provide a fundamental, beautiful structure to the universe.

This project is supported by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Program in Public Understanding of Science and Technology, bridging the two cultures of science and the arts.

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