From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: *** X-Spam-Status: No, score=3.7 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_50,INVALID_MSGID, PP_MIME_FAKE_ASCII_TEXT,REPLYTO_WITHOUT_TO_CC autolearn=no autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII X-Google-Thread: 1014db,1042f393323e22da X-Google-Attributes: gid1014db,public X-Google-Thread: 109fba,1042f393323e22da X-Google-Attributes: gid109fba,public X-Google-Thread: 103376,1042f393323e22da X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public From: "�Stephen!" <99borns@ionaprep.pvt.k12.ny.us> Subject: Re: Off topic response to an off topic message--> was:Re: Software Engineering and Dreamers Date: 1997/06/04 Message-ID: <3395FF96.107E@ionaprep.pvt.k12.ny.us>#1/1 X-Deja-AN: 246147488 References: <5m57nu$7si@bcrkh13.bnr.ca><5mcp5o$ei7$3@news.cc.ucf.edu> <5md1fl$9f4@bcrkh13.bnr.ca><5mmvgj$61k@squire.cen.brad.ac.uk> <01bc7042$609289e0$cb61e426@DCorbit.solutionsiq.com> <5n45ou$cio@squire.cen.brad.ac.uk> Organization: n. A mythical state of being which humans are trying(without success) to atain Reply-To: 99borns@ionaprep.pvt.k12.ny.us Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++,comp.lang.c,comp.lang.ada Date: 1997-06-04T00:00:00+00:00 List-Id: Vibrating Bum-Faced Goats wrote: > > Dann Corbit (dcorbit@solutionsiq.com) wrote: > : Jon S Anthony wrote in article > : ... > : > 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. > > 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. 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..."