-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 Phil Henshaw wrote: > Na, I think even the most sophisticated math misses all the truly supple > shape of natural form, and it it's of huge signifiance in our > missunderstanding of natural phenomena.
I _strongly_ disagree with that. I talk to many people who say things like "I'm not good at math" or "I don't understand math". And I can't help thinking that they must not be talking about the same thing I'm talking about when I say "math". It seems impossible for a person to not understand math because math is pervasive in human activity. For example, all musicians are mathematicians. All brick layers are mathematicians. All lawyers are at least logicians if not mathematicians. Architects, nurses, truck drivers, corporate bureaucrats, and some skate punks are mathematicians. Now, it's true that most of these people don't know how to _describe_ what it is that they do. They just _do_ it without trying to formalize what they're doing. But, as Wittgenstein, Tarski, Goedel, and many others have shown us, math is _more_ than formalization. The working mathematician doesn't spend her days trying to demonstrate the differences between ZF and PA. The working mathematician spends her days thinking about the world and trying to _intervene_ in the world to make something happen (or to explain, predict, describe some thing). Hence, math doesn't _miss_ the "supple shape of natural form", it is derived directly from such natural form. When/if it misses some element, it is because the mathematician failed to capture that element, usually on purpose. p.s. My argument above does not make the word "mathematician" useless by ascribing it to _everyone_ (as Bristol did when implying that every thing is emergent). It is only ascribed to those who attempt to form rigorous conceptions of the things around them and use those conceptions to interact with the world. There are some (Paul Feyerabend comes to mind) who make the case that such strict adherence to method can impede understanding. And that may be true. (I believe it is.) As such, there are plenty of people out there who actively resist the development of and application of rigorous method. Those are not (always) mathematicians. - -- glen e. p. ropella, 971-219-3846, http://tempusdictum.com ... given any rule, however "fundamental" or "necessary" for science, there are always circumstances when it is advisable not only to ignore the rule, but to adopt its opposite. -- Paul Feyerabend -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.6 (GNU/Linux) Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org iD8DBQFGgq55ZeB+vOTnLkoRAk/AAKCWbJFht9SLbIeQV2RGLqHXFWIuDwCfcZk0 gVV8VJ3rnrsyZD+NZOjJh/c= =apsV -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
