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Is math real?

Filip Sandor

Critical Thinker
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Sep 4, 2004
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Just curious what you guys (and gals) think.. is mathematics a real, measurable phenomenon or is it logically incompatible with what we know about physical reality?

The point that confuses me the most is that mathematics seems to be such a natural way of understanding many different aspects of reality. This leads me to suspect a significant 'logical' standing of mathematics in the real world - especially when you consider how useful it is in science and especially the science of physics. Mathe essentially allows us to understand even the most complex phenomenon and all it's segments as they relate to eachother in time, space and even at the level of higher reasoning. We can visualise emotions in a spatial sense by the forces of their effects on other bodies with similar properties (not physical properties of course).

So back to the question.. is math real or is it an abstract creation; which, just happens to aid our intellectual understanding of reality?

One thing that really stands out about mathematics is that it is more a measurement of what exists than a description of what it really is as far as giving any real, coherent defintion of it, this is highly evident in modern physics. For example, it is very difficult for us to conceve of time being anything more than a segmented description of how have happened, how they are happening and using logical deduction, how they should happen, but what really is time?? Can it be defined using numbers alone? Like with most things, the answer is no. So it seems there is a logical 'gap' between reality or our varied perception of it and what might be viewed as a 'static' numerological blueprint of reality.

This should lead one to question whether mathematics is capable of giving us a truly complete definition of reality or even just physics. Yet, we still see an uncanny mathematical system at work in physics studies that seems quite believable.

One interesting question would be this: unless every aspect of reality can be logically deduced using mathematics then how can one we ever hope to predict any number of aspects of reality with utter certainty? I think that if we ever do manage to deduce a completely accurate, mathematical model of physical reality that predicts physical phenomenon exactly we are still going to lack a depth of knowledge of the future. Mathematically we will understand everything - that is, quantatively, but we won't be able to 'calclulate' the nature of our peceptions about the future.

Anyway, I'm curious what other thoughts anyone has on mathematics. Especially curious what you think the answer is to the first question I posed - actually, in this case, is math a logically deducable aspect of reality or wheather it is actually an absract creation?

Feel free to write on physicists quotes, I find those interesting myself as well. :)
 
Filip Sandor said:
Anyway, I'm curious what other thoughts anyone has on mathematics. Especially curious what you think the answer is to the first question I posed - actually, in this case, is math a logically deducable aspect of reality or wheather it is actually an absract creation?
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It's a logicly deducable abstract creation -- a method of modeling relationships between elements.

A mathmatical model may be created which very closely describles physical reality, but that does not imply that every feasible mathmatical model even remotely describes physical reality.

I'd also posit that even the best mathmatical description does not, in itself, imply understanding of the root cause of the physical effect.
 
Is math & logic just another language?

One thing math has repeatedly accomplished is pre-discovery of (perceived-as-physical ;) ) effects, starting with Dirac & the positron. Darn square roots!

And, esoteric math continues to enter the physical prediction business.
 
Interesting topic. As I understand it, the "strange thing" is when in math they can predict a result of something in the "real world", even when physical theories, for example, are still not developed.

How come an abstraction of the world can bring us accurate predictions if it is not "real" in some objective way?
 
If, by real, do you mean that adding and subtracting and measuring exist in the world regardless of observation, then yes, it does. Perhaps in some perfected form which we will never reach, but 1+1=2 no matter how roughly or accurately 1 and 2 is defined.

However, our mathematics, which is our model for physical behavior, is a concept only.

It's kind of like vision. Looking at a chair, is the image you see the chair? No, what you see are electric impulses sent to your brain. But the chair exists, and what you see is as accurate a representation of the chair as your eyes can muster.
 
Keneke said:
It's kind of like vision. Looking at a chair, is the image you see the chair? No, what you see are electric impulses sent to your brain. But the chair exists, and what you see is as accurate a representation of the chair as your eyes can muster.
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Mmm, no. I wouldnt go as far as to say it has ANY "accuracy" to anything outside my belief system. What we see is the creation of our senses-brain, some can argue that it is a "recreation" of something else, but thats it.

Not to say that the chair is not real, or just "in our minds", just that the subject is more complex than what you stated.
 
Filip Sandor said:
Just curious what you guys (and gals) think.. is mathematics a real, measurable phenomenon or is it logically incompatible with what we know about physical reality?
Click to expand...


My opinion is that math supplies always wrong, but useful, models about what we currently perceive as reality. I think at the higher levels of physics (meaning at smaller scales), the difference between 'real' stuff and mathematical models gets smaller and smaller.
 
hammegk said:
Is math & logic just another language?
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I don't think so. While they each employ symbols and syntax to convey meaning, they evolve differently. The tie between a language symbol and its meaning can be transformed by usage. Languages live and change as cultures do. "Dope" has different meanings in different places at different times.

I am not a mathemetician, but I imagine the symbols of math and logic and their meanings are changed only by hard-fought proofs, if ever. Without actually being the concepts they are describing, the symbols and usage are accepted across cultures as the only tangible, workable incarnations of those concepts.

Possibly I'm nuts, but I see math/logic as a way to blueprint (by reverse-enineering or by projection) what can and cannot happen in the universe.

Math folk, feel free to admonish. I'm just talking off the top of my head, here.
 
I'd prefer to contend that math/logic is not only a language, it is the universal language.

Pi is Pi in any Euclidean space. And proofs will exist that 1+1=2.
 
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