Register | Sign In


Understanding through Discussion


EvC Forum active members: 64 (9164 total)
2 online now:
Newest Member: ChatGPT
Post Volume: Total: 916,832 Year: 4,089/9,624 Month: 960/974 Week: 287/286 Day: 8/40 Hour: 0/4


Thread  Details

Email This Thread
Newer Topic | Older Topic
  
Author Topic:   Is Math Science?
Brad McFall
Member (Idle past 5060 days)
Posts: 3428
From: Ithaca,NY, USA
Joined: 12-20-2001


Message 14 of 33 (354258)
10-04-2006 6:31 PM
Reply to: Message 13 by Straggler
10-04-2006 6:25 PM


I vote for invent.
At first blush, I would tend to have already said that I think I would "discover" science but "invent" math. When I thought about what multiplication is as was mentally used by me (in thought), it was ... to discover things in science , and will be so used insofar I have not, but I never felt I was "discovering" mulitplication even though the thought was as original (for me) as the application would then uncover through a discovered process. I may think differently if I thought harder about it but I doubt it.
Edited by Brad McFall, : making the pattern

This message is a reply to:
 Message 13 by Straggler, posted 10-04-2006 6:25 PM Straggler has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 16 by Straggler, posted 10-04-2006 6:44 PM Brad McFall has replied
 Message 18 by nwr, posted 10-04-2006 6:52 PM Brad McFall has replied

  
Brad McFall
Member (Idle past 5060 days)
Posts: 3428
From: Ithaca,NY, USA
Joined: 12-20-2001


Message 19 of 33 (354268)
10-04-2006 6:58 PM
Reply to: Message 16 by Straggler
10-04-2006 6:44 PM


Re: I vote for invent.
It is nice to notice someone suggesting that I present something "clearly" here. You asked and I answered.
Sure it seems to be a case that once a "new area" of math appears in culture the world can sublimly become descripted to "conform to some mathematical laws" even though a collective "we" of the world are not aware of (it) or not.
I would just see that as one stage in the ever expanding "tool set" of mathematicians as to when it might become true that some other math is developed that can do a better job of informing the same formation of lawlike behavior at a second remove.
I am actively thinking of how transcedental numbers can gain say the patterns findable in evoluiontary theory but as of yet there are no "laws" even though the math already exists. If I was to write these applications the older math of "parents" as expressed in population genetics would walk the rope of finer line so constructed. In that future, I might be aware of subjective elements that pass for nothing but a stage in my personal horizon only later to be upbraided (if true in your sense).
When I THOUGHT the product I thought of it NOT as I FIRST LEARNED IT, as a rote table but as something with a potential sense in population thinking and thus "abstract" but via an application rather than a formal 'table' instantiated in a form that might also be analogous no matter the application but as the application was about homology the math and the bio-physical sense were seperated as to the normal form the logic of it would detail.
Using my own ideas is not going to be useful as this does depend on the factual truth which only the math and not my thought of it depends. One could of course say something different if one was refering specifically and only to past episodes in the mathematical history. That is what I meant by giving it a harder and second thought not this explanation of my first thought or sequence from a given thought.
Math is the one part of doing science that is as clear cut as I suggest.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 16 by Straggler, posted 10-04-2006 6:44 PM Straggler has not replied

  
Brad McFall
Member (Idle past 5060 days)
Posts: 3428
From: Ithaca,NY, USA
Joined: 12-20-2001


Message 21 of 33 (354270)
10-04-2006 7:06 PM
Reply to: Message 18 by nwr
10-04-2006 6:52 PM


Re: I vote for invent.
Perhaps I just have not "discovered" enough math. I dont dispute that there can be a humane process that moves from appearences of discovery to invention to discovery. Yes, I dont doubt the history of math to be able to uncover some such.
With math rather than a particular disciplie of science, I can not restrain myself from feeling that SHORT of "discovery" I am simply 'ignorant' and thus, if I was to get "beyond" that state of mind, I would need to "invent" a way beyond rather than simply feel I was beyond no matter what discovery would bring. I do not feel this way in some areas of science. I can feel very certain that NO MATTER THE DISCOVERY it would not matter what I could invent. I can gain a fairly clear sense that no matter what I do not know it is not because I am ignorant. This I can not do when I come to the highest level of "mathematical maturity" I can pretend or think I have. I always feel in math there is a collosal future before that. In science I just have a horizon infinite in two directions, to say it shortly.
Edited by Brad McFall, : wrong word

This message is a reply to:
 Message 18 by nwr, posted 10-04-2006 6:52 PM nwr has seen this message but not replied

  
Newer Topic | Older Topic
Jump to:


Copyright 2001-2023 by EvC Forum, All Rights Reserved

™ Version 4.2
Innovative software from Qwixotic © 2024