Bruno quotes:
"Of this reality, as I explained […], I take a 'realistic" view. At any
rate (and this is my main point) this realistic view is much more
plausible of mathematical than of physical reality, because mathematical
objects are so much more what they seem. A chair or a star is not in the
least like what it seems to be ; the more we think of it, the fuzzier
its outlines become in the haze of sensations which surrounds it; but
'2' and '317' has nothing to do with sensations, and its properties
stand out the more clearly the more closely we scrutinize it. It may be
that modern physics fits best in the framework of idealistic
philosophy---I do not believe it, but there are eminent physicist who
say so. Pure Mathematics, on the other hand, seems to me a rock on which
all idealism founders: 317 is prime, not because we think so, or because
our minds are shaped in one way rather than another, but because it is
so, because mathematical is built that way."
`--- G. H. Hardy, "A Mathematician's Apology", Cambridge University
Press, 1940 (1998)
Exactly why we should recognize that mathematics is made-up. We
understand it clearly because there is nothing to it except what we put in.
Brent
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