Mathematics

[ughaibu]

I was wondering about the use of mathematical representations when dealing with non-mathematical realities (just in case there are any), so I put my ex-girlfriends on the x-axis. Specifically I put them below zero, I put future girlfriends above zero and I put my wife on zero (dont tell her). I then put all my unanswered "why" questions above zero on the y-axis, my answered "why" questions below zero and the matter I was investigating, on zero. This allowed me to define the square roots of minus girlfriends, then, by converting back to ex-girlfriends, I was able to understand what made the fuddy-duddy ones such squares.

[ughaibu]

The above was a serious post, the silliness of the example was an attempt to draw attention to the lack of standard in real-world phenomena, this is why I posted it in the philosophy of science section.

Mathematics deals with ideal generalities with standardised relationships, it's not clear that such entities have any existence in nature and thus unclear that mathematics provides a suitable reasoning tool for examining or conjecturing about nature. Even at the simplest level, mathematics contains ambiguities, for example, two times two equals four seems like a straight forward enough proposition and if conceived as a straight line divided at it's midpoint and then doubled, I'd agree, but when considered as a square, it becomes two x times two y equals four a (areas), quite a different proposition. To take it further, if we conceive 1x2x3x4 in three dimensions, we have several different possible resultant shapes, though all equal 24. What do we get if we multiply two apples by two bananas? etcetera.

In short, if I'd written a watercooler post, I'd have posted it in the watercooler. In future it would be nice if any moderator who is puzzled as to why I've posted something in a particular forum, were to enquire by private message or by replying to the thread.