Greetings Economists,
On Oct 22, 2006, at 2:45 PM, Charles Brown wrote:
Anyway, metaphors have to do with the sameness of relationships, not
the sameness of things.
Arithmetic deals with sameness of things. Algebra deals with
sameness of relationships between things.
Actually, 1/2 = 2/4 is arithmetic. ( my bad)
Doyle;
Well I guess the simple way to say this would be how do you root that in how
the mind works? In the above you make no reference to the brain out all.
^^^^^
CB: I'm thinking more of how math originates in social relationships. The
thing that makes the brain so "big" is that it contains millions of
relationships to other brains, even brains of dead people through messages
left by them in language and stories and math, all culture.
Algebra might be sort of like commodity fetishism. Relationships between
people are portrayed as relationships between things.
That's just a creative thought off the top of my head. Don't hold me to it
:>)
^^^^^
The linguistic theory of metaphors as examples of one network mapped onto
another network structure in the brain is a plausible way of describing the
mental process. Like any materialist theory it's subject to disproval if the
brain processes show something else. So there is no reason as far as I can
understand this that the content of mapping process of the same things or
the same relationships is not metaphorical in either case. The best reason
for arguing this is to address the potential idealism that floats around
about math is some extra material structure that people mine like lead.
Math is a picture of what we can think mentally. Prosaic yes, but not ideal.
In any case the more closely the brain work is tied to reality the more we
can build upon it because the mystifications are dispelled.
thanks,
Doyle
