4 ms·

How useful are universal truths compared to getting shit done? I only see theorems as useful for complex societies. The son of a gem dealer would have the time

How useful are universal truths compared to getting shit done? I only see theorems as useful for complex societies. The son of a gem dealer would have the time to work out universal truths. The reputation of everyone doing it without numbers would reveal the pattern of the universal truth. Finally this looks like it was all done using cuneiform. Which brings up questions of notation and the language to describe a square root.

usrusr 3y ago
Getting shit done is the antithesis of progress because it goes hand in hand with "if it was good enough for my father, it will be good enough for me, who are you to disrespect (the methods of) my father!"
- detourdog 3y ago
  I agree but dying for ideals isn’t much progress. Progress is a luxurious goal.
empath-nirvana 3y ago
What everyone is talking past here is that the Babylonians discovered what engineers call a "rule of thumb", and engineering is focused on getting things done using rules of thumb. The best possible rule of thumb is a mathematical proof or a scientific discovery, but it's by no means necessary. . Observing that something always holds and even having a formula for it is not the same thing as having a proof, and the proof is what makes it mathematics and geometry and not "just" engineering. The babylonians had a rule of thumb -- the greeks discovered the theorem -- and more than that, they seem to have invented the mathematical/geometrical proof as a concept, along with formal logic. Without that mental framework, it's hard to say that the babylonians proved anything or had any theorems at all, only collections of rules of thumb. It's quite likely that lots of babylonians sort of independently and intuitively understood _why_ it must be true, but they don't seem to have ever written it down. Not that there's anything wrong with having rules of thumb -- it's a huge achievement to even notice and collect and teach those things, all the stuff around you is built relying on them. I encourage everyone to watch this series of videos. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ivqWN4L3zU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ivqWN4L3zU
- detourdog 3y ago
  I think what you might be touching on is that the "rules of thumb" may have been so integral of the culture as to be hidden.
ordu 3y ago
> How useful are universal truths compared to getting shit done? As I understand Greeks invented proofs because "universal thruths" they exported from Babylon and Egypt sometimes explicitly contradicted each other. I believe such contradictions may be a great nuisance when you try to get shit done. Egypt and Babylon were sufficiently "complex" societies for proofs, but their tradition treated mathematics as a bunch of useful facts about numbers and shapes. New generation just memorized them. We should think it worked for them in most cases, and when it didn't work it was not so often for them to start thinking a lot of reforming mathematics. Plus they were indoctrinated by the math they learned (authority of a teacher is above of anything else, i suppose) and to reform math was not a natural idea for them.

usrusr 3y ago

Getting shit done is the antithesis of progress because it goes hand in hand with "if it was good enough for my father, it will be good enough for me, who are you to disrespect (the methods of) my father!"

detourdog 3y ago
I agree but dying for ideals isn’t much progress. Progress is a luxurious goal.

empath-nirvana 3y ago

What everyone is talking past here is that the Babylonians discovered what engineers call a "rule of thumb", and engineering is focused on getting things done using rules of thumb. The best possible rule of thumb is a mathematical proof or a scientific discovery, but it's by no means necessary. . Observing that something always holds and even having a formula for it is not the same thing as having a proof, and the proof is what makes it mathematics and geometry and not "just" engineering. The babylonians had a rule of thumb -- the greeks discovered the theorem -- and more than that, they seem to have invented the mathematical/geometrical proof as a concept, along with formal logic. Without that mental framework, it's hard to say that the babylonians proved anything or had any theorems at all, only collections of rules of thumb. It's quite likely that lots of babylonians sort of independently and intuitively understood _why_ it must be true, but they don't seem to have ever written it down. Not that there's anything wrong with having rules of thumb -- it's a huge achievement to even notice and collect and teach those things, all the stuff around you is built relying on them. I encourage everyone to watch this series of videos. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ivqWN4L3zU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ivqWN4L3zU

detourdog 3y ago
I think what you might be touching on is that the "rules of thumb" may have been so integral of the culture as to be hidden.

ordu 3y ago

> How useful are universal truths compared to getting shit done? As I understand Greeks invented proofs because "universal thruths" they exported from Babylon and Egypt sometimes explicitly contradicted each other. I believe such contradictions may be a great nuisance when you try to get shit done. Egypt and Babylon were sufficiently "complex" societies for proofs, but their tradition treated mathematics as a bunch of useful facts about numbers and shapes. New generation just memorized them. We should think it worked for them in most cases, and when it didn't work it was not so often for them to start thinking a lot of reforming mathematics. Plus they were indoctrinated by the math they learned (authority of a teacher is above of anything else, i suppose) and to reform math was not a natural idea for them.