In mathematics

Mathematics

Mathematics is the study of quantity, space, structure, and change. Mathematicians seek out patterns and formulate new conjectures. Mathematicians resolve the truth or falsity of conjectures by mathematical proofs, which are arguments sufficient to convince other mathematicians of their validity...

, the n-category number of a mathematician is a humorous construct invented by Dan Freed, intended to measure the capacity of that mathematician to stomach the use of higher categories

Higher category theory

Higher category theory is the part of category theory at a higher order, which means that some equalities are replaced by explicit arrows in order to be able to explicitly study the structure behind those equalities.- Strict higher categories :...

. It is defined as the largest number n such that he or she can think about n-categories for a half hour without getting a splitting headache.