4 ms·

Homo sapiens is the most arrogant little pile of carbon this side of the Tanhausser gate. While every scientific advance has pushed us further and further away

Homo sapiens is the most arrogant little pile of carbon this side of the Tanhausser gate. While every scientific advance has pushed us further and further away from the center of the universe, we just cant let go of our existential angst of being utterly irrelevant and keep our megalomaniac posturing totaly infatuated with our "specialness". There is no doubt that there something extraordinary profound in the ability of our brains to create coherent representations of reality. But there is an abyss to cross before we can assert that these imperfect, evolving and malleable mental models are actually "all there is". In fact our exciting and beneficial journey of "uncovering" the mathematical fabric of the universe may have ended already. Our mental tools (causality, initial value problems, fields etc.) are powerful but they are rather like hammers looking for nails. We have now almost a century of stagnation around any really new mathematical concepts that would help us push further into "in your face" empirical manifestations, e.g. around complex phenomena. There is no obligation that the Universe is made of nails.

goatlover 3y ago
The success of mathematics in science suggests there is a structure to the universe that can be modeled mathematically.
- lordnacho 3y ago
  But anything that describes structure IS mathematics, so it's somehow tautological?
codethief 3y ago
> We have now almost a century of stagnation around any really new mathematical concepts that would help us push further into "in your face" empirical manifestations, e.g. around complex phenomena. Could you substantiate this rather outrageous claim with some sources?
- nologic01 3y ago
  Me thinks the burden is on you to "easily" invalidate my claim with a single example. Our core explanatory framework (underpining eg quantum or relativity) is essentially still serviced by 19th century mathematics. NB: Actually I would be thrilled if we had such a new tool to explain the universe.
  - codethief 3y ago
    No offense but you made a very broad and rather surprising (= anything but well-established) claim, so the burden of proof is on you I'd say. > Our core explanatory framework (underpining eg quantum or relativity) is essentially still serviced by 19th century mathematics. Eh what? Quantum mechanics and high-energy physics largely build upon functional analysis and representation theory which were largely developed in the 20th century because of quantum mechanics. General Relativity did pick up some concepts which were already developed in the 19th century already but today's formulation is quite a bit more modern (and rigorous) I'd say and there have also been lots of advances on the mathematical side since then. Generally speaking, the issue in fundamental physics is not that we lack the mathematical tools; the issue is that we lack physical insights (from experiments).
    - nologic01 3y ago
      We are drifting into specifics (eg Hilbert spaces were already a first decade of the 20th century thing) that are really not relevant for my argument. The core question is whether the Universe is somehow mathematical (which I would say is the really extraordinary and clickbaity claim of attention seeking physicists with no more serious stuff to work on). The empirical data point that I am trying to derive (so that we don't talk metaphysically) is focusing on the historical development of mathematical physics. The fact that it had spectacular success up to a point but then it stagnated. Does this suggest something about "maths is in our brains" versus "maths is running the universe"? Maybe it does, maybe it doesnt (keep reading). Please note that my asserted stagnation does not concern fundamental physics (where indeed experimental barriers have become the limiting factor). More telling imho is that we have no real mathematical tools to understand complex systems, even of fairly benign nature (non-equilibrium thermodynamics), let alone extraordinary phenomena like biology. We have become comfortable that all complexity can "in principle" be explained, but that is not exactly actually grasping the mathematics of it. Pressumably a mathematical universe is mathematical at all scales, so where is the math? So to recap, my question/challenge is essentially: if the universe is mathematical and we managed to explain quite a bit of it, why not more? There are now more living scientists than ever before. Discoveries are made continuously, but not of the type that counts as a mathematical understanding breakthrough. The answer might be: its just a matter of time (it takes cultural evolution, resources and trial and error for brains to "reconnect" with the underlying math universe) and a near century-long hiatus is part of how this works OR we had a lucky run in the last two/three centuries (some aspects of brain function can do a good job emulating certain aspects of the underlying "non-math" universe) but there is no reason to expect that this will be an ongoing process of "ever closer union". I obviously dont know the answer.

goatlover 3y ago

The success of mathematics in science suggests there is a structure to the universe that can be modeled mathematically.

lordnacho 3y ago
But anything that describes structure IS mathematics, so it's somehow tautological?

codethief 3y ago

> We have now almost a century of stagnation around any really new mathematical concepts that would help us push further into "in your face" empirical manifestations, e.g. around complex phenomena. Could you substantiate this rather outrageous claim with some sources?

nologic01 3y ago
Me thinks the burden is on you to "easily" invalidate my claim with a single example. Our core explanatory framework (underpining eg quantum or relativity) is essentially still serviced by 19th century mathematics. NB: Actually I would be thrilled if we had such a new tool to explain the universe.
- codethief 3y ago
  No offense but you made a very broad and rather surprising (= anything but well-established) claim, so the burden of proof is on you I'd say. > Our core explanatory framework (underpining eg quantum or relativity) is essentially still serviced by 19th century mathematics. Eh what? Quantum mechanics and high-energy physics largely build upon functional analysis and representation theory which were largely developed in the 20th century because of quantum mechanics. General Relativity did pick up some concepts which were already developed in the 19th century already but today's formulation is quite a bit more modern (and rigorous) I'd say and there have also been lots of advances on the mathematical side since then. Generally speaking, the issue in fundamental physics is not that we lack the mathematical tools; the issue is that we lack physical insights (from experiments).
  - nologic01 3y ago
    We are drifting into specifics (eg Hilbert spaces were already a first decade of the 20th century thing) that are really not relevant for my argument. The core question is whether the Universe is somehow mathematical (which I would say is the really extraordinary and clickbaity claim of attention seeking physicists with no more serious stuff to work on). The empirical data point that I am trying to derive (so that we don't talk metaphysically) is focusing on the historical development of mathematical physics. The fact that it had spectacular success up to a point but then it stagnated. Does this suggest something about "maths is in our brains" versus "maths is running the universe"? Maybe it does, maybe it doesnt (keep reading). Please note that my asserted stagnation does not concern fundamental physics (where indeed experimental barriers have become the limiting factor). More telling imho is that we have no real mathematical tools to understand complex systems, even of fairly benign nature (non-equilibrium thermodynamics), let alone extraordinary phenomena like biology. We have become comfortable that all complexity can "in principle" be explained, but that is not exactly actually grasping the mathematics of it. Pressumably a mathematical universe is mathematical at all scales, so where is the math? So to recap, my question/challenge is essentially: if the universe is mathematical and we managed to explain quite a bit of it, why not more? There are now more living scientists than ever before. Discoveries are made continuously, but not of the type that counts as a mathematical understanding breakthrough. The answer might be: its just a matter of time (it takes cultural evolution, resources and trial and error for brains to "reconnect" with the underlying math universe) and a near century-long hiatus is part of how this works OR we had a lucky run in the last two/three centuries (some aspects of brain function can do a good job emulating certain aspects of the underlying "non-math" universe) but there is no reason to expect that this will be an ongoing process of "ever closer union". I obviously dont know the answer.