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Re: Endorsement of Wolfgang Mueckenheim from a serious mathematician
Posted:
Jan 31, 2013 5:31 AM
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On Thursday, January 31, 2013 12:56:53 AM UTC+2, david petry wrote:
> On Wednesday, January 30, 2013 1:58:25 PM UTC-8, Toni...@yahoo.com wrote:
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> > How in the world can a serious MATHEMATICIAN _claim_ that something written in a book/paper has proved "once and for all" that so and so and then, later, he whines he has no expertise, interest and etc. in the paper/book's claims TO DO SO??
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> The word "proof" has two meanings:
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> 1) Informally, a proof is a compelling argument using the intuitively understood reasoning that we have acquired from our experience in the real world. It is entirely possible that that intuitively understood reasoning has never been completely and accurately formalized.
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> 2) A purely formal construct that is inspired by the informal notion of proof but may not be an entirely accurate model of that informal notion.
Don't be ridiculous (oh, well: at least NOT that much): in mathematics it only has one... __unless__... specifically said otherwise.
If a mathematician claims "there is a proof of so and so in this paper" then one assumes he already checked the said proof or at least was led by authiority to believe the said proof is there.
Anyway, to disclaim later that "he was only giving philosophical support and blah-blah" is at least disingenuous and an intellecually coward act, not to mention surprisingly stupid and naive.
Tonio
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