[FRIAM] Confessions of a Mathemechanic.

[Günther Greindl]

Owen,

> No one who accepts mathematics as it is, however, considers it a point  
> of philosophy.  We do not argue about it, we try to grasp it.

I know what you mean, but that what you are talking about is people 
trying to grasp what theorems follow from given axioms; or what theorems 
mean; which connections one can draw between disparate areas etc...

A quite different question is what axioms to adopt in the first place 
(foundationalism? yes? no? how?) and, as has been discussed here 
vividly, the relationship of axiom sets and the theorems to reality.

Dismissing philosophy from mathematics does seem rather rash; the 
discussions in this area are quite interesting.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/philosophy-mathematics/

And people like Benacerraf, Chihara, Field, Resnik, Shapiro etc (just to
pick out a few which come to my mind immediately) have very illuminating 
publications.

What they do is philosophy of math (not: relation math-physics), but as 
Glen has rightly said, everything is intertwined at one level or 
another, and I suspect that most of the confusion surrounding 
applicability of math to reality can be dissolved by getting the 
philosophy right (and that will include philosophy of math and 
traditional metaphysics).

Reality is not confusing. Our mental models are often not in tune with 
reality, and that is what is confusing.


Cheers,
Günther



-- 
Günther Greindl
Department of Philosophy of Science
University of Vienna
guenther.greindl at univie.ac.at

Blog: http://www.complexitystudies.org/
Thesis: http://www.complexitystudies.org/proposal/