Excellent points -- although they sidestep Nick's issue -- which I take to be that some software people (although not you or I) wish that software were as apparently definitive as mathematics. Mathematics has an aura of certainly -- even the certainty about uncertainty seems certain. Software is just code that changes from moment to moment depending on the whim of the developer or customer. Wouldn't it nice (Nick is saying that some software people seem to think) if software were as certain as mathematics.
Of course software can't be as certain as mathematics since it's a constructive discipline. We create new worlds, and the new worlds are in some real sense arbitrary. Mathematics proves things about existing worlds. Of course mathematics also creates new worlds to prove things about, e.g., Euclidean and non-Euclidean geometry, but in some ways that's similar to software libraries. Is it possible to V&V mathematics models of reality more easily/effectively/definitively than software models of reality? I doubt it. The only advantage mathematics has is that (perhaps) one has somewhat more confidence in the internal structure of the model, i.e., how the model behaves. But if the model is complex enough, even that advantage disappears. -- Russ On Wed, Oct 1, 2008 at 11:05 AM, glen e. p. ropella <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>wrote: > Thus spake Nicholas Thompson circa 10/01/2008 10:01 AM: > > Ever since I first came to Santa Fe, and joined the extensive > computation > > culture here, I felt I have detected in the software people here > something > > equivalent to the physics- envy that we psychologists are prone to: let's > > call it math-envy. Math-Envy seems to be that while programming is > subject > > to the vicissitudes of any linguistic enterprise, mathematics displays > true > > formalism.... "you always know where you stand" in mathematics. > > Which character does this sense of math-envy seem to you? > > 1) mathematical _skills_ envy -- i.e. computationalists wish they were > better mathematicians, or > > 2) mathematical _progress_ envy -- i.e. computationalists wish the > discrete math of computation had as much theorem-proof infrastructure as > continuum (and linear) math? > > The distinction is clear to me. I _definitely_ envy traditional > mathematics as a body of knowledge because it has had so many years and > so many brilliant minds working on that infrastructure. If I want to, > e.g., learn about fluid dynamics, I have a plethora of _textbooks_, > hammered out over decades, to which I can turn. But if I want to learn > about, say, impredicative definitions, I have to bounce between > philosophy, ill-written stuff like Rosen's work, category theory, etc. > > In contrast, I don't experience (1) type envy any more than I, e.g., > wish I could build a house or fix my car. The envy is there; but, it's > intellectually mitigated by knowing that I chose not to learn those > skills as thoroughly as I chose to learn other skills. > > When I think of (2) type envy, I wish I were born, like, 100 years from > now so I wouldn't have to work so [EMAIL PROTECTED]@#$%# hard to V&V a > computer model. > > -- > glen e. p. ropella, 971-219-3846, http://tempusdictum.com > > > ============================================================ > 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 >
============================================================ 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
