11/5/2026
By Evan B. Tsingos, Crimson Opinion Writer
Mathematics is the language through which we understand the universe. It is only a slight overstatement to say science is the art of reducing the world to mathematics. After all, mathematics is logic crystallized. Once you have the postulates of your scientific theory, what happens next is forced by mathematics. For the field I know best, theoretical physics, the mathematics needed to describe the universe at its most fundamental level may very well not exist yet.
Furthermore, mathematics provides excellent training in how to think. What I appreciate most about proof-based math is how there is nowhere to hide. One must rigorously justify each step in a solution. That includes scrutinizing definitions, considering edge cases, and ensuring you have not made a subtle misstep in your own understanding. Thinking this way is an invaluable asset in all dimensions of one’s life.
As long as people need to understand the world, they need to learn mathematics — and I wouldn’t want a future where humanity abdicates its understanding of what it spent centuries learning.
https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2026/11/5/tsingos-harvard-learning-math-during-ai/