title: Origins of the brain networks for advanced mathematics in expert mathematicians.
abstract: The origins of human abilities for mathematics are debated: Some theories suggest that they are founded upon evolutionarily ancient brain circuits for number and space and others that they are grounded in language competence. To evaluate what brain systems underlie higher mathematics, we scanned professional mathematicians and mathematically naive subjects of equal academic standing as they evaluated the truth of advanced mathematical and nonmathematical statements. In professional mathematicians only, mathematical statements, whether in algebra, analysis, topology or geometry, activated a reproducible set of bilateral frontal, Intraparietal, and ventrolateral temporal regions. Crucially, these activations spared areas related to language and to general-knowledge semantics. Rather, mathematical judgments were related to an amplification of brain activity at sites that are activated by numbers and formulas in nonmathematicians, with a corresponding reduction in nearby face responses. The evidence suggests that high-level mathematical expertise and basic number sense share common roots in a nonlinguistic brain circuit.
authors.affiliation: Cognitive Neuroimaging Unit, Commissariat à l'Énergie Atomique et aux Énergies Alternatives, Direction des Sciences du Vivant/Institut d'Imagerie Biomédicale, INSERM, NeuroSpin Center, Université Paris-Sud and Université Paris-Saclay, 91191 Gif-sur-Yvette, France; Institut de Formation Doctorale, Université Pierre-et-Marie-Curie, Université Paris 06, Sorbonne Universités, 75005 Paris, France; marie.amalric@cea.fr stanislas.dehaene@cea.fr.
authors.forename: Marie
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Amalric
authors.affiliation: Cognitive Neuroimaging Unit, Commissariat à l'Énergie Atomique et aux Énergies Alternatives, Direction des Sciences du Vivant/Institut d'Imagerie Biomédicale, INSERM, NeuroSpin Center, Université Paris-Sud and Université Paris-Saclay, 91191 Gif-sur-Yvette, France; Collège de France, 75005 Paris, France marie.amalric@cea.fr stanislas.dehaene@cea.fr.
authors.forename: Stanislas
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Dehaene
mesh_terms: D001921:Brain; D001931:Brain Mapping; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008433:Mathematics; D012660:Semantics
keywords: functional MRI; mathematical cognition; semantic judgment