Cold sweats and palpitations are memories that return when this writer recalls math examinations in school. The fear of being unable to crack a sum continues to play truant in our dreams, although we’re thankfully nowhere near a calculus test. While school hours are spent chasing answers to number problems, author and professor, Manil Suri argues that maths is about ideas, not calculations.

Suri, who grew up on Napean Sea Road, is a mathematics professor at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, USA. In his talk at the Asiatic Society of Mumbai, he will delve into how mathematics is really the intelligence that drives the universe. There will be little to no formulas, he promises. Instead, brace yourself for fun symmetry experiments with the Mona Lisa that turn her cock-eyed, and at one point, twirling like a top!