Syntactic theory of mathematical expressions

Abstract

Mathematical expressions consist of recursive combinations of numbers, variables, and operators. According to theoretical linguists, the syntactic mechanisms of natural language also provide a basis for mathematics. To date, however, no theoretically rigorous investigation has been conducted to support such arguments. Therefore, this study uses a methodology based on theoretical linguistics to analyze the syntactic properties of mathematical expressions. Through a review of recent behavioral and neuroimaging studies on mathematical syntax, we report several inconsistencies with theoretical linguistics, such as the use of ternary structures. To address these, we propose that a syntactic category called Applicative plays a central role in analyzing mathematical expressions with seemingly ternary structures by combining binary structures. Besides basic arithmetic expressions, we also examine algebraic equations and complex expressions such as integral and differential calculi. This study is the first attempt at building a comprehensive framework for analyzing the syntactic structures of mathematical expressions.

Keywords: Mathematics; Numerical cognition; Syntax; Theoretical linguistics; Tree structures.