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Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!pwa-b!mmintl!franka
From: franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams)
Newsgroups: net.philosophy
Subject: Re: What it is.
Message-ID: <632@mmintl.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 3-Sep-85 15:41:13 EDT
Article-I.D.: mmintl.632
Posted: Tue Sep  3 15:41:13 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 8-Sep-85 11:21:54 EDT
References: <187@decwrl.UUCP>
Reply-To: franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams)
Organization: Multimate International, E. Hartford, CT
Lines: 25
Summary: 


In article <187@decwrl.UUCP> williams@kirk.DEC (John Williams 223-3402) writes:
>
>	There is one more class of mathematical philosophy you have 
>left out, and that is that mathematics is a language. Like all 
>language, it hopefully represents something in reality, but that 
>is not a requirement. Like all language, it is intrinsically 
>limited in accuracy in describing reality.

No, this is basically the formalist position.  Or perhaps somewhere between
the formalist and realist position, in the sense that it fails to decide
between them.  Saying mathematics is a language doesn't really tell us
anything about the nature of the objects it deals with, which was the
original question.

>	One of the more striking features of mathematics is that 
>there are a multitude of approaches, or techniques, that when 
>performed, will yield the same result. In application, however, 
>there exists an optimum method of analysis that will yield the 
>least residual error.

What does this mean?


Frank Adams                           ihpn4!philabs!pwa-b!mmintl!franka
Multimate International    52 Oakland Ave North    E. Hartford, CT 06108