Terrence Howard
Terrence Howard | |
|---|---|
| Born | 11 March 1969 |
| Nationality | American |
| Known for | "Terryology"; the claim that 1 × 1 = 2; "Lynchpin" geometry |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Geometry, Physics (self-described independent theorist) |
Terrence Dashon Howard (born 11 March 1969) is an American film and television actor who, since the 2010s, has also promoted a personal system of mathematics and physics that he calls "Terryology" and, more recently, "the Lynchpin". He was the keynote speaker at the 2025 Tesla Tech ExtraOrdinary Technology Conference. Howard has no formal scientific training or peer-reviewed scientific publications, and his claims — including the assertion that 1 × 1 = 2 — are entirely his own and are not accepted by mathematicians or physicists.
Biography
Howard was born in Chicago, Illinois, on 11 March 1969. He has said that he studied chemical engineering at the Pratt Institute but left before graduating, and that he remains a few credits short of the degree. In 2013 he stated on Jimmy Kimmel Live! that he had been awarded a doctorate in chemical engineering by South Carolina State University; the university subsequently confirmed that he had never been enrolled there and that it does not award such a degree. He had received an honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from the institution after speaking at its 2012 commencement.
His career is in acting. He appeared in Crash (2004), received an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor for Hustle & Flow (2005), played James "Rhodey" Rhodes in Iron Man (2008), and starred as Lucious Lyon in the television series Empire (2015–2020). He has said that he has retired from acting in order to work full-time on his theoretical ideas.
Ideas
Howard's claims are presented here as he states them. They are his own, they have not been published in any peer-reviewed venue, and they are not accepted within mathematics or physics.
The central claim is that 1 × 1 = 2. Howard's stated reasoning is that if one times one returns one, then multiplication has produced nothing, and "that means that two is of no value". He rejects the number zero, and has said that the whole of arithmetic and geometry must be rebuilt on this basis, in a system he originally called "Terryology" and describes as a "language of logic". He published a version of the argument in 2017.
Alongside this he proposes what he calls Lynchpin geometry, built around the square root of two and around curved rather than straight-line construction, together with terms of his own coinage such as the "Howard Comma Operator" and the "Tetryen shape". On Howard's account these give a single framework unifying energy, matter and information through harmonic resonance and self-organising patterns, and they supersede the Pythagorean theorem. He has also said he can "kill gravity" and has claimed a hydrogen technology and a large portfolio of patents covering the system. A 2024 fact-check by Snopes found that an augmented- and virtual-reality patent application Howard filed in 2010 was abandoned in 2013 without a patent being granted.
Howard has presented these ideas mainly through public talks, podcasts and self-published material rather than through journals. He gave an address and question-and-answer session at the Oxford Union, and appeared at length on The Joe Rogan Experience in May 2024.
Reception
The 2024 Rogan appearance drew wide media attention and substantial criticism. The astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson responded in June 2024, saying that Howard's manifesto contained "assumptions and statements that are under-informed, misinformed, or simply false". Physicists and mathematicians writing publicly at the time, including Sabine Hossenfelder, reached similar conclusions; Eric Weinstein returned to Rogan's programme partly to discuss the episode and the reaction to it. No part of Howard's system has been taken up in the scientific literature.
Within the independent-inventor and Tesla-technology community, however, Howard has been received as a serious speaker: TeslaTech billed him as an "independent scientific theorist" and gave him the keynote slot at its 2025 conference.
Tesla Tech conference talks
He was the keynote speaker at the 2025 ExtraOrdinary Technology Conference, held 6–10 August 2025 at the Crowne Plaza in Albuquerque, New Mexico:
- "A New Geometry for a New Understanding of the Universe" (9 August 2025)