Mathematicians and Luddites

Mathematicians face a Luddite-style disruption as AI automates the computation that has long underpinned their craft, mirroring how automated looms collapsed the weavers' skilled trade in the 19th century. The article draws an etymological link between "text," "textile," and "technology" (from the Greek tekne, or craft), noting that weaving is roughly 20,000 years old and that the Jacquard loom—an early programmable machine—inspired Babbage's computing work. Skilled weavers who destroyed the new looms were met with troops and gunfire, and their trade was ultimately sublated once cloth became cheap and off-the-rack clothing spread, leaving only a few prestigious design roles. The parallel for mathematics is that computation, though never the core of mathematicians' self-concept, has always been required, and AI now threatens to absorb that layer of the work. What to watch next is whether abstract mathematical work follows the weavers' path—shrinking to a smaller, more prestigious elite—or whether the discipline's conceptual core proves harder to automate than cloth production.