On Fri, Jun 24, 2016 at 12:04 PM, Bruno Marchal <[email protected]> wrote:
> > Read the definition in the literature, it does not involve physical > assumption. A definition will tell you absolutely positively 100% NOTHING about the underlying nature of mathematics or physics, it will just tell you things about human mathematical notation and language. You learn about nature from examples not from definitions, even the writers of dictionaries know that. >> >> in fact nothing is Turing emulable >> , not even arithmetic, UNLESS the Turing Machine in question is >> physical. >> > > > > The sigma_1 part of arithmetic is Turing emulable, > Don't tell me show me, don't give me another definition give me an example, calculate 2+2 without using anything physical, or if that's too hard try 1+1. Do that and I'll concede the argument , and immediately after that I'll get on the phone to Silicon Valley. > >> >> >> If there was only one thing in the physical world mathematicians wouldn't >> have the slightest intuition about what numbers mean, they'd just be >> playing with squiggles. Of course if there was only one thing in the >> physical world mathematicians couldn't even exist, but never mind. > > > > > You confuse > No I don't confuse. > > > the mathematics developed by the humans, which are very plausibly inspired > by the observation of nature, and the reality of some mathematical facts. > You admit that to a mathematician who had no experience with anything physical a equation would just mean a sequence of squiggles that had a "=" squiggle somewhere in it, and that's all it would mean. That's it. But if pure mathematics is the most fundamental science and contains profound truths independent of the physical world why does the mathematician need physics to give his equations meaning? Stephen Hawking once asked: *"What is it that breathes fire into the equations and makes a universe for them to describe? The usual approach of science of constructing a mathematical model cannot answer the questions of why there should be a universe for the model to describe. Why does the universe go to all the bother of existing?"* Hawking is saying a mathematical model can't explain why the physical exists, but I think a physical model (like a brain) can explain why mathematics exists. Higher levels can not be expected to explain the existence of more fundamental levels, but more fundamental levels can explain higher levels, and physics is more fundamental than mathematics. John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
