Posted by
Prof David West on
Apr 27, 2009; 12:23am
URL: http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/The-Unreasonable-Effectiveness-of-Mathematics-in-the-Natural-Sciences-tp2714601p2721140.html
On Sun, 26 Apr 2009 13:32 -0600, "Owen Densmore" <
[hidden email]>
wrote:
>
> Fine. But none the less, why is it that the subject line is so
> enigmatically true? .. why do we observe: The Unreasonable
> Effectiveness of Mathematics in the Natural Sciences?
Maybe because of a purely coincidental congruence.
The "unreasonable" part is a function of of an unstated assumption -
that the natural sciences comprise the majority (if not the totality) of
"things to be explained / known / understood."
In my experience, math helps explain and/or is congruent with about 10%
of what I would like to know/understand. There is an equally large set
of things that I would like to know/understand that math not only does
not help, it actually hinders.
Given that experience, there is absolutely no surprise that math (a
formal system) can explain large chunks of physics (those parts that are
themselves formal systems). The congruency is not anywhere near being
"unreasonable."
Using programming as an example, I am not at all surprised by the fact
that math describes and is useful for about 1% of the programming
problems we might encounter. Experience shows that math is not of much
help in most of the problems - and certainly not in the design of
solutions to the problems - that I have encountered over several
decades. And, I am frequently annoyed when mathematics is used as a
bludgeon to force adoption of programming solutions - relational
databases being my pet peeve - that are actually harmful.
If and when someone can show that Reality, and not just scientific
reality, is mathematical I will be surprised.
> My friend Nick to whom I addressed all this (we spar over the
> importance of math) might claim that Math is not particularly
> effective. Do you?
In a later email, Nick claims slander on this point. But, as you can
see in my answer above, I would assert that math is not particularly
effective outside a small domain where it is.
davew
>
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