Virgil
Posts:
4,482
Registered:
1/6/11
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Re: Endorsement of Wolfgang Mueckenheim from a pseudo-serious non-mathematician
Posted:
Jan 31, 2013 6:39 PM
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In article <587156d4-e3c8-48e4-b849-4ab2924893cd@googlegroups.com>,
david petry <david_lawrence_petry@yahoo.com> wrote:
> I admit that I don't understand WM's technical claims. However, when I see
> you and other mathematicians fail to comprehend, or at least fail to respond
> coherently to, very simple, clear and straightforward informal arguments, it
> doesn't inspire confidence in me that you are qualified to judge whether WM's
> technical claims are valid.
>
> Here is a simple, clear and straightforward informal argument, which I
> believe Mueckenheim would endorse, that I have never seen a Cantorian
> mathematician respond to in a coherent way:
>
> It is eminently reasonable to believe that the purpose of mathematics is to
> provide a rigorous and practically useful conceptual framework for reasoning
> quantitatively about real world phenomena.
There are many mathematicians of note, such as G.H. Hardy,
who take quite a different view.
(See, for example, "A Mathematicians's Apology" by G,H, Hardy
http://archive.org/details/AMathematiciansApology )
It is mainly physicists who insist that mathematics be about their world.
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