人类数学的可压缩性揭示了其在形式数学中的稀有地位。
Compression is all you need: Modeling Mathematics
- 用代数结构建模数学推导,定义通过宏压缩表达式。
- 实际数学库中展开长度随深度指数增长,但封装长度基本恒定。
- 压缩特性可用来识别值得关注的数学方向,指导自动推理。
人类数学(HM)是人类发现并重视的数学内容,仅占形式数学(FM)——所有有效推导的总和——的一小部分。我们提出,HM 的特征在于可通过层级嵌套的定义、引理和定理实现高度压缩。我们使用幺半群建模这一过程:数学推导是原始符号串,定义或定理是命名子串或宏,使用它们可压缩表达式。在自由阿贝尔幺半群 $A_n$ 中,对数稀疏的宏集即可实现指数级表达力扩展;而在自由非阿贝尔幺半群 $F_n$ 中,即使多项式密度的宏集也仅带来线性扩展,超线性扩展需接近最大密度。我们在大型 Lean~4 数学库 MathLib 上测试该模型,其每个元素具有深度(定义嵌套层数)、封装长度(定义中词元数)和展开长度(完全展开后原始符号数)。结果表明,展开长度随深度和封装长度呈指数增长,而封装长度在各深度下近似恒定。这些结果与 $A_n$ 模型一致,与 $F_n$ 不符,支持人类数学占据形式数学中多项式增长子集的论点。我们进一步讨论如何基于 MathLib 依赖图的压缩度与类似 PageRank 的分析,量化数学兴趣,引导自动化推理聚焦于可压缩区域。
原文摘要 · Abstract (English)
Human mathematics (HM), the mathematics humans discover and value, is a vanishingly small subset of formal mathematics (FM), the totality of all valid deductions. We argue that HM is distinguished by its compressibility through hierarchically nested definitions, lemmas, and theorems. We model this with monoids. A mathematical deduction is a string of primitive symbols; a definition or theorem is a named substring or macro whose use compresses the string. In the free abelian monoid $A_n$, a logarithmically sparse macro set achieves exponential expansion of expressivity. In the free non-abelian monoid $F_n$, even a polynomially-dense macro set only yields linear expansion; superlinear expansion requires near-maximal density. We test these models against MathLib, a large Lean~4 library of mathematics that we take as a proxy for HM. Each element has a depth (layers of definitional nesting), a wrapped length (tokens in its definition), and an unwrapped length (primitive symbols after fully expanding all references). We find unwrapped length grows exponentially with both depth and wrapped length; wrapped length is approximately constant across all depths. These results are consistent with $A_n$ and inconsistent with $F_n$, supporting the thesis that HM occupies a polynomially-growing subset of the exponentially growing space FM. We discuss how compression, measured on the MathLib dependency graph, and a PageRank-style analysis of that graph can quantify mathematical interest and help direct automated reasoning toward the compressible regions where human mathematics lives.
Thank you to arXiv for use of its open access interoperability. PaperDance 不是 arXiv 官方产品;中文卡片由大模型生成,请以原文为准。