/sci/ - Science & Math

>>7305349

invented because we define things and based on the definition we do stuff

>>7305349
invented

>>7305349
all these questions ever come down to is a reference frame

Is math the invention to keep us from contradicting our selves?

We invent it based on discoveries

Both, we invented the notion of a triangle but we discovered the Pythagorean theorem

We invented the words but discover the sentences

Bad math is invented, good math is discovered.

>this is the only morally correct answer

>>7305349
The numbers and symbols used are a human invention. They are an imitation of reality. They can be considered a discovery.

Neither, it's proclaimed.

>>7305349
Imagine a different planet. No humans exist on it, but another intelligent species does. What sort of mathamatics would they come up with?

Would they have their own pythagorem theorem? Their own Algebra? Yes, most likely.

The rules of mathematics are universal, and would exist even if humans did not. We only discover more of them as our knowledge progresses.

Both: G*D brings about the mathematical structure in the Universe, and we discover G*D's creation.

>>7305349

>>7305484
TL;DR

both. constants of nature that can be described using systems of what we know as numbers are there to begin with, but what humanity recognizes as math is ultimately an invention to interpret and rationalize these.

>>7305468
I agree. An interesting thing to think about is scale. For instance. Imagine the units of measurement someone on Jupiter would use for distance and mass versus someone on Mercury

>>7305469
Ultimate pleb answer. God can't even estimate pi to two digits in His holy texts. 1 Kings 7:23.

>>7305469
>G*D

>>7305690
Things like c, G, and h are universal.

The values of those numbers are dependant on measurement scale, but the idea of them is constant. Radiation will move through the vaccuum with a constant velocity. Masses will Attract with a certain force related to distance. The idea of those constants will not change, even if the actual numbers used for them are different.

>>7305846
>>7305690
Neither of these posts have anything to do with math. That's science.

>>7305386
Stopped reading at this point. Checkmate.

>>7305469
In the end, the search for truth is simply the search for god

>>7305349

discovered

>>7305430
That contradicts the principle that something cannot precede its constituent parts.

>>7305440
This. Do your math morally, young mathematicians!

>>7305349
>This question
>kek le kek
The physical phenomena are discovered, our models of them are obviously invented.
Seriously try this shit on /lit/

My personal, considered view is that pure mathematical truths are discovered, and persist independently of human thoughts about, or knowledge of, them.

The name that wiki gives to the (always minority when these threads pop up) Discovery camp, is mathematical realism, of which Platonism is a subset, with Godel as a main proponent. Search "philosophy of mathematics".

Parts of Wittgenstein's Tractatus also assert certain features of logic (preceeding mathematics) as being independent of the world. This amounts to the same discussion, in the sense that it is asserted (or denied) that certain abstract truths persist independently of reality, the physical world, a knower knowing them, etc.

A prime number goes on having the property of being a prime number, regardless of whether anyone in the universe knows what a prime number is. As one concrete (and accidentally physical) example, this is shown when n cubes can be arranged into a noncubic rectangular prism in exactly one way, up to the ordering of the cubes involved. But it is not necessary that a physical world exist, that this one truth exist.

Although I know that the debate is an old chestnut, I am dismayed that several posters seem to have taken a confused detour into physics. Although it is true that certain physical /observations/ are regularly discovered, this really has nothing to do with the mathematical question. Where the philosophy is concerned, the two are disjoint. If you take a conventionally atheistic/materialistic worldview, physics is an accident. Math and logic are not accidents, or contrivances.

-a math major

>>7305349
definitions are invented, theorems are discovered

I won't disturb the chicken, or her egg. She's resting nicely, and doesn't need to be bothered.

But, it /is/ a little bit like the question, "If a tree falls in the woods, and no one's around...?" Here, my reply would be that the sound is made, and it is not necessary that anyone hear it, for it to have taken place. Although a philosophically valid question, it also has a certain human conceit to it - "It's okay, I'm here now, the sensory-perceptual party can start now. Now things count." Other flavors of this same conceit are used in Descartes' skepticism of all reality based on routine sensory failure, and the philosophical zombie problem (how do you know for a fact that others are actual beings just like you, and not just automata?)

Although the physical world is accidental, patterns can be observed, which lead to "laws" of physics. But these are not necessary. It is not necessary that the sun rise, and the laws of physics are where my defense of the reality of the tree's unheard sound stops. If the sun does not rise, then the tree's sound is as conditional (perhaps someone moved the air away).

What is necessary, is that ( p V ¬p ) /\ 2 + 2 = 4 /\ a2 + b2 = c2.

>>7305349
>hurr I posted it for the 500th time

check the archives, then kill yourself
(better yet, skip the first step)

>>7305349
Invented. Everything we know is just conventions designed to explain the world.