The
Kavli Foundation sponsored an interdisciplinary discussion of the origins of math.
What are the origins of math? They had 2 physicists, a neuroscientist, and a cognitive scientist. The 2 physicists seemed to be taking the stance that the universe is a mathematical construct. They think this because of the fact that everything they do involves mathematics, so they assume that the universe is based on mathematics. I'm not sure I understand just what they mean by that.
The others seemed to feel that we have a cognitive inclination to mathematics, if it is just an intuitive understanding of numbers, even if we don't have words for the numbers. Some cultures don't have words for more than a few numbers, but can express larger numbers in other fashions. Read the link, it will tell more about that.
The non-physicists tend to think that the reason that all of physics is expressed in mathematics is because we have developed a large number of way to calculate different things, then thrown away the ones that don't work.
I tend to go along with the non-physicists on this one. We are just lucky that we have been able to develop mathematical structures that match the universe. We didn't find the mathematical structures that control the universe.
I wasn't sure if this was the right place to put this. It could have gone into the physics discussion. If anybody wants to move it that would be all right with me.
Bill Gill
