On 4/5/2015 9:12 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:
If you mean something else by physical, I have no idea what you mean.
It is what is studied by physics, mainly through empirical means: the measurable
quantities in laboratories.
Aristotle (well mainly its followers) assume that the physical reality is irreducible,
so that we have to assume primitively physical objects, like atoms, particles, 3d
spaces, or today, strings for example. It makes physics the fundamental science
(physicalism).
I was just saying that arithmetic is not a branch of physics, that numbers, sets,
functions, are, by virtue of their definitions, not physical. More below.
That's like saying electrons are not physical because they're defined by Dirac's
equation. "Physical" just means we can interact with it in our common, non-solipist world
and reach intersubjective agreement about it. It's no more magic than supposing prime
numbers exist because they're defined by axiom systems.
Brent
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