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/sci/ - Science & Math

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6978873 No.6978873 [Reply] [Original]

Math is the basis of the universe, necessary in every other science. Is it possible to suck at math yet be a good scientist? If so how?

>> No.6978881

>>6978873
Can you empirically demonstrate that math is the basis of the universe, and not just a useful fiction?

>> No.6978885

>necessary in every other science

except biology, sociology, psychology, CS, geology and literally any other soft science

>> No.6978898

Einstein sucked at math. He failed his middle school differential geometry class.

>> No.6978906

>>6978873
>Math is the basis of the universe
What? How?

>> No.6978907

>>6978906
Math is lin indep and the universe equals its span

>> No.6978908

>>6978885
>Math not necessary in CS
This must be one of those "american community college" memes

>> No.6978909

>>6978898
nice popsci

fag

it's not true

>> No.6978913

>>6978906
I think he meant "Math is the basis of our understanding of the universe" or something like that.

>> No.6978914

>>6978898
>middle school differential geometry
40 keks

>> No.6978943

>>6978873
It is possible. Even in physics, the most math heavy science. Best example I can think of off the top of my head was Faraday.

>> No.6978951

Why stunt yourself intentionally? Anybody can learn math, it's not like you have to be von neumann dividing 8 digit numbers in your head.

>> No.6979015

Maths is just a tool. Chemistry is where it's at. Fuck yeah making drugs!

>> No.6979025

I am a synthetic organic chemist and good at it while I suck at math. I will never need to be good at math either. Feels good man

>> No.6979083

>>6978873
Sure
A scientist can focus on a particular experimental area, improve methods, to find new and higher quality results. They can use the math that other people have done.

>> No.6979086
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6979086

>> No.6979088

>>6978943
>Best example I can think of off the top of my head was Faraday.
But do you think this is true today, when we have discovered quantum mechanics?

>> No.6979112

>>6979088
First, it's not common to be a physicist and not be decent at math. But, yes I think it could still happen today. I don't know how much physics you've taken, but Faraday's discoveries were in E&M and that subject is much more mathematically complex than quantum mechanics.

It was rightly stated earlier in the thread that it is just a myth that Einstein was really bad at math. That's true. But his physical insights were so much beyond his mathematical abilities it is astounding. It's like he had a pulse on the universe (ya...I know, he never did unify all the theories...give the guy a break though :D )

>> No.6979205

>>6978873
Depends on what you think when you say "to suck at maths". I guess that most scientist just uses maths instead of doing maths (like research, trying to prove something, resolving new problems, etc.)
To do maths or to use maths, the difference, if there's any, is probably a bit subtle, but I imagine that if when you say "suck at maths" you think about doing maths, then it's possible.

>> No.6979220

>>6978907
topkek

>> No.6979227 [DELETED] 

>>6979112
I never disagreed with the notion that one could be a good scientist, even physicists, while being bad at math.
I was just trying to point out that intuition, which helped Faraday make up for his lack of mathematical training, might not help you in QM.
And I can't really think of an area of research in modern physics which neither involves QM nor requires some mathematical sophistication.
What "suck at math" means exactly would be important to answer OP's question.

>> No.6979247

>>6979227
I hear ya. QM is definitely weird but maybe you'd be surprised at how often physicists in condensed matter think of things in classical/semi-classical ways? Bottom line, I guess I'm saying that I think there's a big difference between being good at physics and being good at math. I bet a lot of the best mathematicians would suck at physics. Of course it is the language we've found most useful at describing nature with, though. Math is kind of the language of patterns, but maybe it's not the only language of patterns? It's hard to put into words, but I majored in math and physics and am now getting a PhD in physics. Math and physics are very different to me.

>> No.6979254

>>6979247
Math is more than a language.

>> No.6979258

>>6979247
I said 'kind of'. It's hard to give an all encompassing definition for math.

>> No.6979266

>>6979258
We could build on the language analogy and say that math has its culture.

>> No.6979523

>>6978873
Depends. Do you consider womyn's studies a science

>>6978885
You're an idiot

>> No.6979548

>>6978951
I can't even divide 4, kek
I don't have good mental visualization

>> No.6979551

>>6978885
Stats are math, and they are relevant in all of those fields.
>>6979523
Women's Studies seems to be more philosophy. Any science involved is observational, which isn't bad, just not something one can replicate.

>> No.6979594

>>6979551
>Women's Studies seems to be more philosophy.
Absolutely. They don't consider it a science, either. To many of them, the attempted study of objective reality is a tool of patriarchy and oppressive

>> No.6980073

>>6978873
Step #1) Not be an autistic faggot.

You worthless B movie grade parasites inject your intentionally over complicated faggotry into EVERYTHING. ALL the fucking time. I can render 1000 of you completely useless with 100 feet of string, a bit of chalk, a straight edge and a hand saw. I can LITERALLY build a house from the god damned ground up, BY HAND, before you could do all of the god damned calculations. And if you parasitic inner city faggots try to warp one more god damned blueprint on me midwork, one more god damned time, I swear by ALMIGHTY SATAN I'm gonna cut you in half.

>> No.6980100

>>6980073

And without advanced mathematics, you'll be limited to building houses.

No one's saying you'd need state-of-the-art mathematics to live a medieval lifestyle, anon.

Also, carpentry isn't generally regarded as a scientific field.

>> No.6980151

>>6980073
Oh look an idiot. When the intelligent speak morons like you who have to resort to mindless work to make a living (basically a human farm animal) better obey and not complain. When youre done go sit in the corner, little mental boy :)

>> No.6980185

how can a human invention be "the basis of the universe"? math is used to describe, not to create.

>> No.6980189

maths a tool
>being the faggot that studies wrenches and hammers all day
>not being the guy that uses wrenches and hammers to make the world go round
fucking spergs

>> No.6980344

>>6980189
You're a tool.

>> No.6980355

Geologist here. Math does shit for describing groundwater flow, evapotranspiration, subsurface geological structures, isopach mapping, or any other number of shit in any of my field of research.

What DOES describe those things? Trial and fucking error does. /sci/ worships math far too much and as funny as XKCD sometimes is it's written by a pompus asshole with absolutely no research experience.

You won't use math much outside of school and any math you will use is high school level at best.

>> No.6980372

>>6978873
>Is it possible to suck at math yet be a good scientist? If so how?
You don't have to be able to design and build a car from scratch in order to drive one.

>> No.6980389

>>6980355
>You won't use math much outside of school and any math you will use is high school level at best.
well sure if you study a babby subject like geology or engineering

pls, do not offer your opinion on things you know nothing about, adults are talking

>> No.6980392

>>6980389
>engineering
>literally has no fucking clue what engineering consists of
fuck off, if you don't know shit about something, don't talk shit like you've got a clue

>> No.6980398

>>6978873
Sure. PW Anderson (a much, much smarter man than you) wrote about a paper about this, "More is Different." Complexity is sui generis. Radical autistic reductionism can't give you satisfactory accounts of big things that actually matter to human beings, like behavior or politics or cognition, because sufficiently complex things arrogate their own laws beyond the sum of their parts.

>> No.6980419

>>6980392
engineering is vector calc and at the very most PDEs, of course its not as easy a field as geology but its not like you need any real math for it either

>> No.6980422

>>6980419
>real math
spergs never prosper

>> No.6980423

>>6980419
> talking out of ass continues

>> No.6980429

>>6979112
>that subject is much more mathematically complex than quantum mechanics.
What? You kidding me? Quantum mechanics is far more mathematically mature! You think you need notions such as rigged Hilbert spaces, Fock spaces or infinite-dimensional vector spaces for E&M. Hell no, even Jackson is just a whole lot of Bessel functions and vector calculus. In fact, considering that in time-dependent perturbation theory we can formulate all of E&M within QM. What math is needed for E&M that is beyond QM?

i.e.,
mathematically complicated != mathematically complex

>> No.6980432

>>6980389
>muh physics

Sperglord's gonna sperg. How's being unemployable going?

Also, most physics curricula are a joke.

>> No.6980436

>>6980423
>implying it isn't 100% true

>> No.6980440

>>6980436
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sprezzatura

>> No.6980441

>>6980436
>NEET tries to bullshit about things he knows fuck all about

>> No.6980449
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6980449

>math is the best science

>> No.6980497

>>6980429
I agree with >>6979112. That was the consensus of my whole grad class, too. Just so we are comparing apples to apples, I'm referring to my first graduate series of QM and E&M since you can get as complicated mathematically as you want in just about any physics subject. Jackson was a nightmare. I found the linear algebra and group theory of QM straight forward and easy. E&M was a special function orgy. Horrible. I'm glad to be done with it. RE: complicated vs complex, they're synonyms.

>> No.6980505

>>6978885
>CS

Good luck understanding complexity (which makes the difference between a useless algorithm and a good algorithm)

>biology

Last time I spoke to a biology student he complained about being fed up with Fourier transofrms. And that's not even talking about the spread of probability in biology.

>sociology, psychology

What is the basis of data analysis that those two rely upon to make sense of their emirical studies, according to you ?

>>6978873
Don't worry, OP, there's currently no shortage of mathematicians willing to tackle the maths scientists need. Good scientists need a minimal proficiency at maths, but that isn't much, depending on the science (you can be a good biologist without understanding what a linear combination is). You guys' added value is in actually devising experimental stuff and putting sensible conditions on the maths problems so that they become solvable and able to describe real-life systems.

>> No.6980513

>>6980398
> because sufficiently complex things arrogate their own laws beyond the sum of their parts.

It's kind of a lame meme that maths is only about reducing things to the sum of their parts, though. Hell, that phrasing doesn't even makes sense mathematically.

>> No.6980521

>>6978873
Less basis of the universe, more basis of how your mind breaks down the universe.

But there's math for the holes that result as well. It's just... fuzzy.

>> No.6980523

>>6980497
When we say QM, can we also include QFT? Because I can draw a Feynman diagram that would make Jackson cringe.

Have you read Wald? Those exercises take up PAGES of tensor calculus (partially due to his shitty notation, why no differential forms?). However, looking at his chapters on causality and singularity, I would say that math is certainly complex (differential topology + differential geometry), but not necessarily complicated.

Long story short, E&M can get needlessly complicated, but so can QTF, easily. And String Theory takes the cake when it comes to the combination of ridiculously long calculations and mathematical maturity.

>> No.6980546

>>6980523
That's why I made the point about trying to stick with first year QM vs E&M. But, yes QFT made for some really long HW problems as well. It seems like you can make any physics subject as complicated mathematically as you want. I remember skimming through a classical mechanics book in the library that was formulated using topology and all kinds of other esoteric mathematics. No doubt about String Theory, but now we're really far afield!

>> No.6980549

Why do math and physics undergrads feel the need to circlejerk all the time?

>> No.6980641

>>6978898
actually, Einstein was doing vector calculus by the time he was 12 years old, so you can fuck off.

>> No.6980644 [DELETED] 

>>6978873
>>6978908
>>6979523
>>6979551
>>6980505
Allow me to play doubles advocate here for a moment. For all intensive purposes I think you are wrong. In an age where false morals are a diamond dozen, true virtues are a blessing in the skies. We often put our false morality on a petal stool like a bunch of pre-Madonnas, but you all seem to be taking something very valuable for granite. So I ask of you to mustard up all the strength you can because it is a doggy dog world out there. Although there is some merit to what you are saying it seems like you have a huge ship on your shoulder. In your argument you seem to throw everything in but the kids Nsync, and even though you are having a feel day with this I am here to bring you back into reality. I have a sick sense when it comes to these types of things. It is almost spooky, because I cannot turn a blonde eye to these glaring flaws in your rhetoric. I have zero taller ants when it comes to people spouting out hate in the name of moral righteousness. You just need to remember what comes around is all around, and when supply and command fails you will be the first to go.

Make my words, when you get down to brass stacks it doesn't take rocket appliances to get two birds stoned at once. It's clear who makes the pants in this relationship, and sometimes you just have to swallow your prize and accept the facts. You might have to come to this conclusion through denial and error but I swear on my mother's mating name that when you put the petal to the medal you will pass with flying carpets like it’s a peach of cake.

>> No.6980645

>>6980189
We scientists need our mathematician brothers.
Mathematics prepares logic for us to use.

>> No.6980647

>>6980355
of course a fucking geologist doesn't value math.

>> No.6980650

>>6980645
i never said we don't need it or that it's not important, i'm just tired on threads on this sperg ass board dedicated to le beautiful maths purest science bown down plebs muh notation bullshit

>> No.6980654

>>6978885
>not maths in CS

are you fucking retarded?

>stats
>linear algebra
>discrete maths
>graph theory
>lambda calc

>> No.6980659

>>6980521
There is nothing except structure. Show me a part of the universe that can't be described mathematically and I'll show you a concept of which it is impossible to think.

>> No.6980663

>>6980644
>doubles advocate

You'd better be careful, we're not on /b/.

>> No.6980666

>>6980659
>analytical solutions to two phase turbulent flow problems
>analytical solutions to the schrodinger eq for anything but the hydrogen atom

>> No.6980670

>>6980663
pasta is not allowed in /sci/?
also, I'm not native english speaker, and the pasta doesn't even make sense to me...
anyway, I'm deleting it. thanks, and sorry.

>> No.6980671

>>6980670
I was just making a joke about you playing "doubles advocate" and getting dubs.

The pasta is composed using numerous eggcorns.

>> No.6980672

>>6980671
ah, lol
too bad, I deleted it :P

>> No.6980712

>>6978873
>Is it possible to suck at math yet be a good scientist?

Forty five years since man first walked on the Moon and people still ask this question.

>> No.6980715

>>6980355
>You won't use math much outside of school and any math you will use is high school level at best.

Largely true, however, there is an awful lot of math tucked away in computer programs that people blindly plug their data in to. And yes, I've ended a sentence with a preposition.

>> No.6980718

>>6980549
>Why do math and physics undergrads feel the need to circlejerk all the time?

Amen brother.

>> No.6980727

>>6980355
I know this is bait, but http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groundwater_flow_equation

>> No.6980739

>>6978885

Literally every one of those fields uses math.

>> No.6980747

>>6980715
Get over yourself, ending sentences with prepositions has always been standard English.

>> No.6980755

>>6980747
I just started calling them postpositions.

>> No.6980780

>>6978885
>sociology, psychology
>science

ULTRA KEK

>biology
it's a research field, they use a lot of statistics

>> No.6980978

>>6980355
Amen. PREACH!

>> No.6980981
File: 53 KB, 640x512, 4chins.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
6980981

>>6980389
>pls, do not offer your opinion on things you know nothing about, adults are talking
Maybe you should take your own advice, autistic faggot. IRL most of this intentionally overcomplicated nonsense will NEVER be used. For you autistic faggots who live your entire lives inside computers i virtual faggotry, maybe. Fine. Whatever. For those of us who have or have had a REAL life, its bullshit and we know it. And I don't say this as someone who can't do math. I graduated in the top 5% of ALL high school students in the US. I still have the certificate the state gave me to prove it.

>> No.6980987

>Is it possible to suck at math yet be a good scientist?

It used to be, I don't think so anymore. In the days of Michael Faraday and Thomas Edison you could do exceptional work knowing basic algebra. Because science these days is so much complex, I'd say no. Unless you're a marine biologist or something.

Then again, even math isn't good enough. The key skill a scientist needs is the ability to notice things no-one else does. You can be the best mathematical thinker in the world, but if you don't have the ability to notice something and say "hey, that doesn't look right" and pursue it, you're pretty much worthless.

>> No.6981191

>>6980981
ok, so when you were 18 you may have an IQ between 110-120

>> No.6981203

>>6978873
>Biology applied chemistry
Because organisms comprise molecules HUEHUEHUEHUE

>> No.6981238
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6981238

>>6980987
Trust me, marine biology has more math than we know what to do with.

pic related: what I'm reading right now

>> No.6981242

>>6981238
> so much mathzzz

>> No.6981249

>>6981238
Fourier series? Come on...that's taught in a first course on ordinary differential equations.

>> No.6981271

>>6978885

Geologist here, Let me tell you that all major branches of Geology use mathematics in some regard.

For Paleo, it's usually statistics and regressions

For Structural/Tectonics it's usually Physics based derivations

For Energy/Geochem/Isotopes there are numerous calculations with chemical measurements,

For mineralogy it's usually geometry and chemical measurement calculations

For geomorphology it's derivations for things like discharge and other stream characteristics

I don't know what your perspective on Geology is... but math is very necessary in its application.

Probably bait, but fuck you anyway.

>> No.6981384

>>6981238
If sophomore math (freshman if you can negotiate with registration people) is more than you know what to deal with, I have some bad news for you...

>> No.6981393

>If so how?
trial and error, lol

>> No.6981415

>>6978873
Depends what do you mean "being bad at math".
You only have to learn what is necessary for your subject. Mathematician can't do biologists job and biologist cannot do mathematicians job. The End.

>> No.6981424

>>6981271
> miller indices

>> No.6981462

>>6978873
>Is it possible to suck at math yet be a good scientist? If so how?

Have you ever meet a biologists? Or worse a pre-med student?

>> No.6981485

>>6981462
What about bioinformatics fuccboi?

>implying you understand the knot topology of protein folding

>> No.6981702

>>6980549
>Why do math and physics undergrads feel the need to circlejerk all the time?
Good question.

>> No.6981712

>>6981702
>Why do math and physics undergrads feel the need to circlejerk all the time?
>Good question.
It's because harmonic oscillators in different forms is pretty much all we study as physicists

>> No.6981713

>>6978885
CS IS nothing but math past undergraduate level.

>> No.6981823

>>6981485
I once read a paper on RNA folding that used path integral methods. Doesn't mean every biologist understands that stuff. You picked out a very small subset of mathematical biology, big whoop.

>> No.6982035

>>6981238
You have been duped into useless busy work.

>> No.6982071

>>6980449
I have never in my life seen a fedora autist who studies maths. Maybe at a community college, or "applied maths", but never at a good/decent uni. Maths is hard and needs commitment, too hard for stupid, undisciplined fedora autists.

>> No.6982730

>>6980344
>You're a tool.
Son, I've forgotten more things than you will ever learn.

>> No.6982734

>>6981415
>Mathematician can't do biologists job and biologist cannot do mathematicians job. The End.
That's hilarious. Your brains aren't wired to do real things in the real 3d world. Most of you have ZERO social skills and ZERO practical ability. A fatal combo. When it comes time for most of you math nuts to step away from your chalk/dry erase boards you are fucking helpless and it shows.

>> No.6983108

>>6980666
Absence of analytical solution doesn't mean absence of mathematical description.

>> No.6983127

>>6982730
You condescension isn't cool anymore, dad.
And I'm not even your son. Seriously, you should check out that Alzheimer.

>> No.6983131

>>6982734
I beg to differ, sir. R^3 is very easy to deal with for us.

>> No.6983214

>>6980981
>implying high school was difficult.

>muh 5%

>> No.6983224

>>6980981
>implying standards across high schools.
da fuck?

>> No.6983233

I can't believe OP baited you all. This thread has turned into people trying to prove how legitimate their field is, by listing off all of the mathematics that is involved.

Good science is progressing your field of study to better understand it.

Sure, it will most likely take some level of math to do it. Yet, if you can do it without math no one is going to ridicule you for it. Except maybe /sci/

So, go out there and make some discoveries, don't sit at the computer arguing over muh maths. Faggots.

>> No.6983264

>>6982734
How is that hilarious? He's pointing out the fact that when you get trained in one field you're not trained to do stuff in another field. Also your comment is very much filled with unnecessary assumptions and hints at a superiority complex. Let's bow down to the stereotypes.

>> No.6983272

>>6978881
I think I know what you. Math is the language of laws of quantity.

>> No.6983542

>>6983233
Sounds like someone has physics envy. (YOU)

>> No.6985544

>>6983233
...but math is important within the fields of social science. If your observations have no statistical significance how are they useful if not to falsify hypothesis? Even then they'd only be useful because math told you the null hypothesis was wrong.

Sorry I went on a rant. My psi friends all want to help people directly and are kinda dismissive of experimentalism. I wanna do cognitive and behavioral research so that ticks me off but I can't blow steam on their faces so I complain on the internet.

>> No.6985549

>>6985544
Excuse me I made a blunder. The null hypothesis is RIGHT if the effect you wanted to find is not statistically significant.

>> No.6985557

>>6978885
Hahahaha! Did you just say math is not needed in biology, sociology, psychology, CS, geology etc.? All fo those subjects need statistics, which is maths...

>> No.6985569

formal science (logic)?

>> No.6985686

a person can understand math but not put in the work required to actually learn it. if you can understand the logic of it, solving problems won't be hard and the more problems you solve with that logic, the more it becomes natural to you. most people find repetition boring, but it's through that repetition that you accept the logic completely.
there have been a lot of things during history that were discovered without putting insane work into math first.
the world at the moment is perfect for people who don't know math, and I mostly blame CS for it and computers. you can work in autocad and make a model of a working motor without actually doing many calculations.

>> No.6985688

>>6985686
CS major here. You mad cause we make bank by dumbing down applied math so even normies can use it?

>> No.6985692

>>6985688
nah, do your thing honey. it's just funny when you see a person who's good in autocad and wants to become a mechanical engineer, but he gives up because he can't simplify complex fractions and has always hated math.
my math has only helped me so far in life so I can't say it's pointless to learn it, definitely not mad. just feel bad for those people.

>> No.6985714

>>6978873
>Is it possible to suck at math yet be a good scientist?
No. Science is a subset of math.

>> No.6985791

>>6979086
>strawmanning falsifiability: the image

>> No.6985794

>>6980429
complicated: consisting of many interconnecting parts or elements

Complex: consisting of many interconnecting parts or elements

LOL

>> No.6985909

As someone who dropped out of university and now works in the most boring tech support imaginable, I use math in order to make up for lost time I could have spent being successful.

Ah, well.

>> No.6985914

>>6985909
Hate to say I told you so..

>> No.6985919

>>6985914
Yes, I know ;-;

>> No.6985938

>>6978873
>Math is the basis of the universe,
Get the fuck out of here, philosophy-fag. We want to actually discuss math, not your stupid, useless philosophy bullshit.

>> No.6986907

>>6978873
yes

faraday

>> No.6987055

I'm not sure. From what I have seen of physics (that is, some thermodynamics, electromagnetism and classical mechanics), mastering computations (by that I mean, basic calculus and vector calculus) undeniably helps but it's not math and it's not the essential part of solving a problem (otherwise it's either a really dumb or a really hard one). What seems important in physics is the intuition of the phenomenon (ie. knowing what is likely to happen without writing anything down and being able to discard "non-physical" solutions) then knowing which phenomena you can neglect in order to simplify calculations (which might otherwise be intractable) without trivializing the problem or obtaining obviously wrong results. The first quality has no counterpart in math (that I know of) but the second one is also a very useful tool from an analyst's standpoint (and it is not surprising to see that the field of PDE is at the interface of math and physics).
All this to say that I don't think that it is possible to be very good in physics and totally suck at math (at least not in real analysis and differential equations), but again the approaches of math are very different in the two fields. In physics, you can justify the unicity of solutions for a differential equation with some handwaving and just discard all other possible solutions as non-physical, which would be unthinkable in math.
For other sciences: Most of the aspiring biologists and geologists I have met don't do math anymore except statistics, suck at it and are badly taught (it is apparently still the case at a research level, which i think is kind of unsettling)
Computer science doesn't require much math except basic combinatorics, lots and lots of cleverness and some calculus for asymptotic approximations. However, I doubt that you can be very good in theoretical computer science and totally suck at math (considering that it's pretty much a subset of math), but the approach is different, more playful maybe

>> No.6987064

>>6987055
good post