Re: Off topic response to an off topic message--> was:Re: Software Engineering and Dreamers

["�Stephen!" <99borns@ionaprep.pvt.k12.ny.us>]

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Vibrating Bum-Faced Goats wrote:
> 
> Dann Corbit (dcorbit@solutionsiq.com) wrote:
> : Jon S Anthony <jsa@alexandria> wrote in article
> : <JSA.97Jun2174143@alexandria>...
> : > In article <5mmvgj$61k@squire.cen.brad.ac.uk> cgrussel@bradford.ac.uk
> : (Vibrating Bum-Faced Goats) writes:
> In otherwords, just because we do not know of something or are unable to
> comprehend it does not mean such a thing does not exist.

	Little kids don't know what gravity is, but when they fall down...

> What I'm trying to say here is that it could be argued (by me amongst
> others) that the relationships between objects and phenomena exist
> anyway. Mathematics is the ongoing creation of a extraordinarily rich and
> diverse language which enables us to express those relationships. A
> mathematician is creating a tool for scientists and engineers alike. It
> may require a mathematician to make use of that tool at times but, at
> it's very core, tool creation is what I believe to be the essence of maths.

	I like to think of mathematics as a means of expressing the
relationships between numbers. The angles of a square, the lengths of
the sides of a pentagon, even the relationships between musical notes
can be expressed as a pattern of numbers. C4 is 12 notes from C5 is a
perfectly valid mathmatical statement. Programming is merely a way of
expressing the relationships between a computer and the outside world.

<snip>

> 
> That is what I meant by saying "Mathematics exists in the mind alone".
> The relationships and properties are already there but the language
> used to describe them is a human creation.

	One is a totally arbitrary name. It may be called "Throbene" for all it
matters, it is merely a way of expressing the number. The names for the
numbers are a human invention, the numbers themselves are not.

<snip>

	Math is similar to English in this respect. The object exists whether
you call it "water", "aqua", etc. To quote Shakespeare "A rose by any
other name smells just as sweet..."

-- 
�Stephen!
Maintainer of the Punk and Metal Midi Archives
	http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/4063/index.html

"Just the thoughts of a disillusioned teen..."