cousin_it comments on The two meanings of mathematical terms - Less Wrong

-2 Post author: JamesCole 15 June 2009 02:30PM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Comments (78)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: komponisto 15 June 2009 08:47:13PM *  3 points [-]

Please see this previous comment of mine.

The point here is that it "1+1=2" should not be taken as a statement about physical reality, unless and until we have agreed (explicitly!) on a specific model of the world -- that is, a specific physical interpretation of those mathematical terms. If that model later turns out not to correspond to reality, that's what we say; we don't say that the mathematics was incorrect.

Thus, examples of things not to say:

Comment author: cousin_it 16 June 2009 01:29:41PM *  2 points [-]

Re the last quote: I didn't expect Eliezer to say something like that. Has he actually ever seen a finite set?

Comment author: Amanojack 02 May 2011 05:01:59AM 0 points [-]

Perhaps he meant "seen" in the sense of "visualized." What happens when we try to introspect on our visualization of some mathematical terms?

Well I can't visualize an infinite set, but neither can I imagine a finite set, nor the number 5 for that matter. I can imagine five dots, or five apples, but not 5. In terms of my visualization, "5" seems to be an unfinished utterance. My mind wants to know, "5 what?" before it will visualize anything, or else it just puts up 5 black circles or whatever.