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Re: Mathematics as discourse about form:
Posted:
Jan 1, 2013 11:22 PM
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On Jan 1, 6:20 pm, Virgil <vir...@ligriv.com> wrote:
> In article
> <640fb339-f250-40aa-a1a7-9fc624b72...@r14g2000vbd.googlegroups.com>,
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> Charlie-Boo <shymath...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > On Jan 1, 3:06 pm, Virgil <vir...@ligriv.com> wrote:
> > > In article
> > > <b6477fc7-91ab-4ee2-a972-4a77ed52b...@x20g2000vbf.googlegroups.com>,
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> > > Charlie-Boo <shymath...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > > > What is the difference between math and the other branches of science?
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> > > For one thing, mathematics is not a 'branch' of science!
> > > For example, which theorems of mathematics does one ever "prove" by
> > > experimentation or by its conforming to physical evidence?
> > > --
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> > If proof is your gauge, then math wins over physics and the other
> > physical sciences hands down. Non-math science can never prove its
> > conclusions. They are approximate and history shows there is always a
> > lower level that hasn't been considered yet - Newton was trumped by
> > Einstein and no physical experiment can be conducted without
> > interfering with the results you are attempting to measure.
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> > What reasonable definition of science excludes mathematics? How do
> > you define science? I say, science is that which is predictable. And
> > that includes math.
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> Mathematics is, for one thing, independent of both physical reality and
> experimental evidence (though useful in describing and analyzing both),
> which sciences are not.
Why is the purely mathematical experiment of graphing the solutions to
X^N=1 for various N, seeing that they seem to - there is evidence that
- they form regular polygons, then verifying it with validation of
that conjecture logically, not an example of an experiment, evidence,
a conjecture and conclusion exactly in the sequence that it occurs in
your physics experiments?
Science is that which is predictable. We try to input (control the
future) or output (know the future) the predictions. That goes for
both flowers and Turing Machines.
> Science attempts to describe, or, in a sense, abbreviate,
"reality" by
> finding patterns in the events we observe.
It attempts to predict and control reality by looking for a logical
sequence whose next value follows the same pattern and is thus
predictable.
C-B
> --
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