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Re: Patriarchy: Re: What Matriarchy?
Mark K. Bilbo (102217.121@compuserve.com)
Fri, 23 Aug 1996 09:57:09 -0600
In article <woody-1608961303260001@192.0.2.1>,
woody@alumni.caltech.edu (William Edward Woody) wrote:
>> A much more interesting question, IMHO, is why nature seems to follow
>> mathematics. That is, why are physical theories expressed in
>> mathematical form so effective? There doesn't seem to be any a priori
>> reason why this should be so, and a lot of scientists and philosophers
>> are very puzzled by it. This should warm the cockles of the hearts of
>> those who have an anti-science agenda, but, as far as I know, they
>> haven't picked up on it yet.
>
>My personal pet theory is that nature follows mathematics because mathematics
>follows nature: that is, we invented mathematics to describe what we
>saw in nature, and used nature as a guidepost to tell us what part
>of mathematics we should throw out, and what part of mathematics we
>should keep and use.
I've always thought the routine of questioning why nature "follows"
mathematics to be a silly one. It's the other way around. Where do people
think we obtained mathematics to begin with, K-Mart? <g>
What I find personally curious is the possible implications of Goedel's
work on the models of reality the human mind creates. They are rather
formal systems and, from where I sit at least, it seems that those folks
who believe their model of the universe to be complete are pretty far out
in left field (check out Falwell sometime <g>).
And if mathematics follows nature, did Goedel discover that the universe is
incomplete or that our perceptions of the universe always are?
Mark
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