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Hnnngg
United States1101 Posts
On June 07 2012 08:51 sam!zdat wrote: huh? There are lots of aspects of human knowledge one does not study as a hard science major... Am I misunderstanding what you are saying? Somewhat. http://xkcd.com/435/ A mastery of hard science makes you know... about everything. I'd rather have Michio Kaku as a President than Ivy League Graduate Lawyer #1045693. | ||
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sam!zdat
United States5559 Posts
"Purity" in that strip is just fundamentalness (and it leaves out philosophy, which should be to the right of mathematics, c.f. Frege, Russell, Wittgenstein, et. al.) But it is a mistake to confuse fundamentalness with truthfulness, or usefulness. Mathematics is more fundamental, but not more true or more useful, than e.g. sociology. | ||
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Kalingingsong
Canada633 Posts
do you touch yourself at night?  (^ credibility test) | ||
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Hnnngg
United States1101 Posts
On June 07 2012 09:00 sam!zdat wrote: That is a very naive view of the nature of human knowledge. "Purity" in that strip is just fundamentalness (and it leaves out philosophy, which should be to the right of mathematics, c.f. Frege, Russell, Wittgenstein, et. al.) But it is a mistake to confuse fundamentalness with truthfulness, or usefulness. Mathematics is more fundamental, but not more true or more useful, than e.g. sociology. Yeaaaaaah you just said mathematics isn't more useful or true than sociology, so you and me are done talking to each other. | ||
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sam!zdat
United States5559 Posts
On June 07 2012 09:26 Hnnngg wrote: Yeaaaaaah you just said mathematics isn't more useful or true than sociology, so you and me are done talking to each other. Ok. Have fun figuring out everything in life with math... edit: How old are you, and how much education do you have? Just out of curiosity. I'm fascinated by people who think things like this. | ||
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DoubleReed
United States4130 Posts
On June 07 2012 09:41 sam!zdat wrote: Ok. Have fun figuring out everything in life with math... edit: How old are you, and how much education do you have? Just out of curiosity. I'm fascinated by people who think things like this. If you think mathematics isn't useful, then I don't know what to tell you. Statistics, geometry, and calculus are used in literally every scientific field. Hell, don't get me started about Bayes' Theorem, which is probably one of the most useful things you could ever learn about in life and is the basis of all empiricism (look it up and how it applies to daily life). Yes, I plan on having fun figuring everything out in life through math. Good luck with your intuition and guessing. I have no idea what you mean by truth. This is some weird definition that makes no sense. In math things are True and False, as opposed to all those sciences which use Laws or empiricism. I mean that's fine, don't get me wrong, but things are actually true in mathematics. | ||
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sam!zdat
United States5559 Posts
But other things are true and useful as well. You can't derive everything you need to know from zermelo-fraenkel plus choice, you know... Sometimes you need to study complex systems which cannot be usefully reduced to mathematics. That should be obvious. edit: I have no idea what you mean by truth. This is some weird definition that makes no sense. In math things are True and False, as opposed to all those sciences which use Laws or empiricism. I mean that's fine, don't get me wrong, but things are actually true in mathematics. I understand this. I actually have some background in the philosophy of science, and most of my friends are mathematicians, for what it's worth, so I have a pretty good understanding of what mathematics is. | ||
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DoubleReed
United States4130 Posts
On June 07 2012 10:22 sam!zdat wrote: I never said mathematics wasn't true or useful... But other things are true and useful as well. You can't derive everything you need to know from zermelo-frankel plus choice, you know... Sometimes you need to study complex systems which cannot be usefully reduced to mathematics. That should be obvious. Yes, you need a model. What's your point? It's still absolutely certain within your model. Unlike the sciences which uses empiricism. Empiricism cannot obtain absolute certainty because it relies on Bayes Theorem. How do you make anything useful without mathematics and statistics? How do you estimate or approximate without mathematics? Things don't 'reduce down' to mathematics. Things rely on mathematics at every level. I understand this. I actually have some background in the philosophy of science, and most of my friends are mathematicians, for what it's worth, so I have a pretty good understanding of what mathematics is. Then please don't abuse the word 'truth.' | ||
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sam!zdat
United States5559 Posts
Can you prove to me mathematically that reducing all phenomena to mathematics is the best way to go about things? | ||
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sam!zdat
United States5559 Posts
On June 07 2012 10:28 DoubleReed wrote: Then please don't abuse the word 'truth.' I'm not. There are different sorts of truths, not just a priori analytic ones. edit: Also, I'm not sure why you think I'm dismissing the usefulness of mathematics. Math is great... Also, I'm an idealist of sorts, by which I mean that I think the universe is fundamentally MADE of math. None of this changes anything. | ||
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DoubleReed
United States4130 Posts
On June 07 2012 10:30 sam!zdat wrote: For example, consider the following: Can you prove to me mathematically that reducing all phenomena to mathematics is the best way to go about things? Your question is circular. The best way to answer it would be to use mathematics, but I can't show that without first showing that the best way to answer it would be to use mathematics. I'm not. There are different sorts of truths, not just a priori analytic ones. ...I have no idea what you're talking about. This sounds fluffy and poorly defined. | ||
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sam!zdat
United States5559 Posts
On June 07 2012 10:34 DoubleReed wrote: Your question is circular. The best way to answer it would be to use mathematics, but I can't show that without first showing that the best way to answer it would be to use mathematics. Precisely! Please meditate on this for some time. When you come back, I will give you a certificate of enlightenment. | ||
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sam!zdat
United States5559 Posts
On June 07 2012 10:34 DoubleReed wrote: ...I have no idea what you're talking about. This sounds fluffy and poorly defined. You should take this up with Kant, not me. edit: Here's the wikipedia entry for this. Please note that I haven't studied this topic in great detail: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Analytic–synthetic_distinction | ||
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DoubleReed
United States4130 Posts
On June 07 2012 10:35 sam!zdat wrote: Precisely! Please meditate on this for some time. When you come back, I will give you a certificate of enlightenment. I... what? All right, I can't respond anymore without getting insulting and disrespectful. You're just silly. | ||
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sam!zdat
United States5559 Posts
On June 07 2012 10:40 DoubleReed wrote: I... what? All right, I can't respond anymore without getting insulting and disrespectful. You're just silly. Perhaps. Have you studied much philosophy? It often seems silly until you understand what the question actually is, at which point it becomes deeply problematic and you lose a lot of sleep. edit: And I'll add that being able to carry on a conversation without becoming insulting and disrespectful is a useful life skill (which cannot, of course, be reduced to mathematics)  edit again: And please note that the circularity is not in my question, but in your original claim. My question is designed to make you see this internal contradiction in your position. | ||
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DoubleReed
United States4130 Posts
On June 07 2012 10:42 sam!zdat wrote: Perhaps. Have you studied much philosophy? It often seems silly until you understand what the question actually is, at which point it becomes deeply problematic and you lose a lot of sleep. edit: And I'll add that being able to carry on a conversation without becoming insulting and disrespectful is a useful life skill (which cannot, of course be reduced to mathematics) No, I don't care much for philosophy myself. I'm a mathematician. The question is simply a poor one. I don't think I need to meditate more than that. It's not that hard to come up with circular, idiotic questions. Well, if I was more awake I could come up with good jabs that would be a lot more clever and trololol, but at the moment I am drawing a blank. There's no fun in berating someone if you can't do it hilariously, you know. I would suggest you look up Bayes' Theorem, because it does pertain to philosophy and belief. You might find it fun and enticing. And please note that the circularity is not in my question, but in your original claim. My question is designed to make you see this internal contradiction in your position. Uhh... I see it as tautological or possibly axiomatic, but not contradicting... | ||
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sam!zdat
United States5559 Posts
Do you realize that mathematics as you know it comes out of philosophy? Specifically early twentieth century analytic philosophy, like Frege and Russell, who essentially invented set theory? Uhh... I see it as tautological, not contradicting... Hmm... can you elaborate on what the tautology is? edit: so perhaps "essentially invented" is an overstatement... at least "made significant contributions to." I don't want any limbs breaking beneath me. | ||
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sam!zdat
United States5559 Posts
edit: I know it's popular for people who do everything with numbers to think that people in humanities departments spend all day picking lint from the navels and talking about flowers, and due to the sad state of the humanities in our educational system there is an element of truth to this, but you can't seriously think that there are NO objects of inquiry which can't be usefully studied with mathematics. For example, why has Western culture changed so much in the last 100 years? Do you have a mathematical explanation for this? Can you characterize the change mathematically? | ||
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DoubleReed
United States4130 Posts
On June 07 2012 10:52 sam!zdat wrote: Yes, I'm familiar with Bayes theorem. I have studied it in the context of the philosophy of language, though I am hardly an expert. I don't see what it has to do with this, however. Do you realize that mathematics as you know it comes out of philosophy? Specifically early twentieth century analytic philosophy, like Frege and Russell, who essentially invented set theory? Hmm... can you elaborate on what the tautology is? edit: so perhaps "essentially invented" is an overstatment... at least "made significant contributions to." I don't want any limbs breaking beneath me. Set Theory is philosophy? Is logical systems philosophy? I've only heard of them in the context of specifically mathematics. I've never studied philosophy, but I've studied logic. Care to elaborate about what is contradicting? I see absolutely no contradiction. I see my answer being forced to be circular, but that means it's tautological, in which case maybe "things are better solved with mathematics" needs to be taken as an axiom in my model or something. But I can't see where I contradict myself anywhere. Bayesians take Bayes' Theorem to be the basic law of belief. Anything that you believe is example of Bayes' Theorem. Through this lens it actually becomes the basis of the scientific method (in fact, completely surpassing the scientific method). Beliefs are used in everyday life to do even menial tasks, and using Bayes' Theorem can let you benefit even in this way. Anyway, the point is, how are you going to go about studying history or making a better, more just society with just pure mathematics? edit: I know it's popular for people who do everything with numbers to think that people in humanities departments spend all day picking lint from the navels and talking about flowers, and due to the sad state of the humanities in our educational system there is an element of truth to this, but you can't seriously think that there are NO objects of inquiry which can't be usefully studied with mathematics. For example, why has Western culture changed so much in the last 100 years? Do you have a mathematical explanation for this? Can you characterize the change mathematically? This is confusing. I'm not insulting humanities, am I? You can't study history or society or whatever without understanding things like biology/chemistry, because that's how humans work. I don't really understand your point. Mathematics CAN be used to study history or make a more just society. We use statistics all the time to figure out the issues in society. Mathematics can be applied at all levels, and is usually used to actually provide context and meaning to the other stuff. I'm not saying mathematics is exclusively useful (which seems to be what your question is getting at), I'm saying it is useful at all levels all the time. | ||
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sam!zdat
United States5559 Posts
Bayesianism is not uncontroversial, though I'm out of my comfort zone here and I'm not really qualified to discuss it. I do know that there are things which are worth knowing that the scientific method can't really help you with (although I think students in the humanities very often underestimate the importance of scientific models and paradigms for their own studies, empirical methods of inquiry cannot replace critical inquiry as such. Culture, for example, is a phenomenon which really exists, and has real, material effects on the world, but resists the application of empirical scientific inquiry.). Is your claim that mathematics is the only and best way to go about collecting all knowledge? edit: It will perhaps be amusing to note that, in my field, people think I'm weird because I like math too MUCH. So I'm really not trying to dismiss math here, because I think math is a very useful thing to study. But it is not the be-all end-all of human knowledge, as some mathematicians (but very few philosophers) like to think. | ||
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