Appears in collection : Mikefest : A conference in honor of Michael Douglas’ 60th birthday

A growing number of mathematicians are having fun explaining mathematics to computers using proof assistant softwares. This process is called formalization. In this talk, I'll describe what formalization looks like, what kind of things it teaches us, and how it could even turn out to be useful (in our usual sense of "useful"). This will not be a talk about the foundations of mathematics, and I won't assume any prior knowledge about formalization.