If math is more than proof, we need to better celebrate the rest of it

[This is a guest post by Grant Sanderson. This blog post was initially written in a different file format and converted using AI. — T.] A sentiment echoing throughout the mathematics community right now is that solving problems and generating proofs have always served as proxies for the true goal of mathematicians, which is to further human understanding. When proofs can be generated without that understanding, it undermines their value as a proxy. This immediately raises a question: What other proxies should we use instead? I want to propose that we more firmly define a notion of a “motivated explanation” and that we give novel and compelling motivated explanations academic credit similar to what generating new proofs of open problems has had historically. Further, I believe this is an important step to help those outside of math better understand what it is that mathematicians contribute. If outsiders believe that proof-generating machines render mathematicians obsolete, while…