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SUMMARY:Mathematical practice\, crowdsourcing\, and social machines - Ursu
 la Martin - Queen Mary\, University of London
DTSTART:20131104T130000Z
DTEND:20131104T140000Z
UID:TALK48455@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:William Denman
DESCRIPTION:For centuries\, the highest level of mathematics has been seen
  as an isolated creative activity\, to produce a proof for review and acce
 ptance by research peers. Mathematics is now at a remarkable inflexion poi
 nt\, with new technology radically extending the power and limits of indiv
 iduals. Crowdsourcing pulls together diverse experts to solve problems\; s
 ymbolic computation tackles huge routine calculations\; and computers\, us
 ing programs designed to verify hardware\, check proofs that are just too 
 long and complicated for any human to comprehend.\n\nMathematical practice
  is am emerging interdisciplinary field which draws on philosophy\, social
  science and ethnography\, and the input of mathematicians themselves\, to
  understand how mathematics is produced.  Online mathematical activity  pr
 ovides a rich source of data for empirical investigation of mathematical p
 ractice - for example the community question answering system mathoverflow
  contains around 40\,000 mathematical conversations\, and polymath collabo
 rations provide transcripts of the process of discovering proofs. Such inv
 estigations show the importance of "soft" aspects such as analogy and crea
 tivity\, alongside formal deduction\, in the production of mathematics\, a
 nd give us new ways to think about the possible complementary roles of peo
 ple and machines in creating new mathematical knowledge\n\nSocial machines
  are new paradigm\, identified by Berners-Lee\, for viewing a combination 
 of people and computers as a single problem-solving entity\, and the subje
 ct of major international research endeavours. We outline a research agend
 a for mathematics social machines\, a combination of people\, computers\, 
 and mathematical archives to create and apply mathematics\, with the poten
 tial to change the way people do mathematics\, and to transform the reach\
 , pace\, and impact of mathematics research.
LOCATION:Computer Laboratory\, William Gates Building\, Room SS03
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