KnaveOfAllTrades comments on The value of learning mathematical proof - Less Wrong

3 Post author: JonahSinick 02 June 2015 03:15AM

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Comment author: KnaveOfAllTrades 02 June 2015 03:36:14AM *  1 point [-]

Yes!! I've also independently come to the conclusion that basic real analysis seems important for these sorts of general lessons. In fact I suspect that seeing the reals constructed synthetically, or the Peano --> Integers --> Rationals --> Dedekind cuts construction, or some similar rigorous construction of an intuitively 'obvious' concept, is probably a big boost in accessing the upper echelons of philosophical ability. Until you've really seen how axioms work and broken some intuitive thing down to the level that you can see how a computer could verify your proofs (at least in principle), I kind of feel like you haven't done the work to really understand the concepts of proof or definition or seen a really fully reduction of a thing to basic terms.