Mathematician, writer, Cornell professor. All cards on the table, face up, all the time.
Ithaca, NY
Joined May 2012
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A free sample of BIG MATH (my new book with Alex Townsend) is now up on Amazon. Hope you like it!
read.amazon.com/sample/03165…
Steven Strogatz retweeted
Never a dull moment chatting with Steve Strogatz
Thank you to Grant Sanderson @3blue1brown for having me on his podcast – and I hope you enjoy our open-hearted, tentative, exploratory conversation about math in the age of AI. We tried out a lot of ideas on each other. youtu.be/xUSznTR2cwc
Thank you to Grant Sanderson @3blue1brown for having me on his podcast – and I hope you enjoy our open-hearted, tentative, exploratory conversation about math in the age of AI. We tried out a lot of ideas on each other. youtu.be/xUSznTR2cwc
Steven Strogatz retweeted
Congratulations to the 2026 winners of the National Academies Eric and Wendy Schmidt Awards for Excellence in Science Communications given by @theNASEM in partnership with @schmidtsciences!
Learn more about the winners: nationalacademies.org/news/n… #scicomm
Steven Strogatz retweeted
Here's the links to the conversation:
YouTube: youtube.com/watch?v=ZAzWPE9C…
Spotify: open.spotify.com/show/2MAi0B…
Podcast: lexfridman.com/podcast
Steven Strogatz retweeted
This is an incredible moment in this history of mathematics, computer science, physics & science with some of the hardest problems in human history being solved by AI over a period of weeks. Depending on your perspective, it's either a crisis, a triumph, or both. I don't think anyone knows for sure. We're all trying to make sense of it. I oscillate between fear/dread and optimism/excitement on a daily basis. The rate of progress is insane, including today's announcement from OpenAI of more problems solved.
To help make sense of all of it, here's my conversation with three mathematicians about this moment. Each of them is an expert in the field of each of the biggest problems solved: Navier-Stokes, quasi-Riemann hypothesis, the unique games conjecture and complexity theory more generally.
Ankur Moitra is a mathematician and theoretical computer scientist at MIT, visiting the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. Steven Brunton (@eigensteve) is a mathematician and fluid dynamics expert at UW. Alex Kontorovich (@AlexKontorovich) is a mathematician at Rutgers specializing in number theory.
Steven Strogatz retweeted
I was brought to tears on Sunday when the last milestone cleared. My father, a mathematician who passed in Jan, introduced me to the giants of group theory as a kid. The Classification of Finite Simple Groups (CFSG) defined my 80s college years. I can't believe I somehow got to be part of this human achievement. CFSG formalized in Lean. @leanprover
Steven Strogatz retweeted
The largest math proof in human history is now computer-verified.
Today, Axiom announces a complete Lean auto-formalization of the Classification of Finite Simple Groups, the "periodic table of symmetry."
About 15,000 pages, built by over 100 mathematicians across generations.
In this latest dispatch from the front lines of math in the age of AI, I tried to tell it like I see it. theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/1…
Steven Strogatz retweeted
There is a major result on the KPZ equation in 2+1 dimensions!
This looks like a great example of what the near future of math research could look like.
Here you have an 11-author paper--basically all top experts who had been working in this direction in recent years--combining all their recent results and insights and prompting Astra like maniacs. The result: a major problem in critical SPDEs that everyone in the field was wondering about is now solved!
Fantastic!
Human + AI interaction ==> more understanding
If you care about math and AI, this Substack post by Jonathan Marek will resonate with you. I'm honored by being mentioned in it, but Jonathan is too honest to admit that he was also in the pantheon of Mr. Joffray's former students at @loomischaffee. cultureandcompass.substack.c…
Mesmerized by this sculpture by Forrest myers, "Valledor", at @art_omi. It's a 3-regular graph.
Steven Strogatz retweeted
Two weeks ago, Rikhav Shah and I posted a preprint on the growth factor in Gaussian elimination, and settled a very old problem. It turns out complete pivoting and rook pivoting have quasi-polynomial growth. I’ve spent a decade thinking about this problem. math.mit.edu/~urschel/prepri…
Steven Strogatz retweeted
I’m very opinionated. So it’s nearly impossible for me to hear someone’s arguments and *not* find something I disagree with. (This includes reading things I myself wrote years - or weeks - ago.) And yet the amazing Grant Sanderson @3blue1brown has put out a long, detailed video on the future of mathematics, in which I cannot find a single flaw. I’ll be sending this to every PhD student and postdoc I know, and strongly recommend everyone watch it.
youtube.com/watch?v=LKrwhjOI…
(Of course I tried to say many of the same things in my conversation with Thomas Koberda. But Grant’s version, unsurprisingly, does an infinitely better job at communicating those ideas!)
NFL Player Turned Mathematician (@JohnCUrschel) Solves Problem that Eluded Scholars for Decades
On the growth factor for Gaussian elimination – great interview with Christiane @amanpour
youtu.be/W1uiG8rk2Eg?is=1neW… via @YouTube
Steven Strogatz retweeted
this was an awesome podcast, and i think this one he did was even better --> radiolab.org/podcast/math-vs…
gets more into his thoughts on the pros/cons of relying on AI that is smarter than us but we don't understand when the stakes are higher (cancer diagnosis)
Steven Strogatz retweeted
Loooved this episode of The Daily.
They chatted with a math professor at Cornell University (Steven Strogatz) about how he and math community are feeling about AI's impact on their world.
Lots of tears, and profound takes.
Listen to the episode here: nytimes.com/2026/10/13/podca…
Or here: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcas…
Beautiful talk by Grant Sanderson @3blue1brown about a fun question in geometry, the problem-solving utility of thinking topologically, and the buildings of Frank Gehry. Oh yes, and also about "The Role of Exposition in the Future of Mathematics" youtu.be/PtCPLLuMK1o?is=C-UI…