Brent Meeker wrote:
> But the only reason for axiomatizing a physical theory is to see if it
> has some
> hidden inconsistency.
I don't think so. Except Bunge, I don't know about physicist attempt to
axiomatize physics. Physical theories are always to fuzzy as to be
formalised. But they rely on math which can be formalized, but this is
only a logician preoccupation.
> Of course it is extremely unlikely that it is arithmetic that will be
> changed simply because it would mean revising so many theories
> (including common
> sense ones); but it is not ruled out in principle.
I agree. With the exception of some rare ultra-intuitionist or
ultra-finitist, everybody agree on arithmetic. That is why Aritmetical
realism, as I understand it, is a very weak assumption.
>> Note that if you understand the whole UDA, you should realize that the
>> price of assuming a physical universe (and wanting it to be related
>> with our experiences *and* our experiments) is to postulate that you
>> (and us, if you are not solipsistic) are not turing emulable.
>
> Perhaps I misunderstood. I thought it only implied that you were
> *probably*
> being turing emulated - not that you necessarily were.
?
No, if comp is true you are certainly emulate (even before the
reversal).
But if "matter" exists in a primary way (like Peter D. Jones describes
it), then the UDA leads to our non turing emulability. UDA shows "I am
turing emulable" => physics emerge from number relations.
>> But "2" is just another notation for "xx".
>
> No I meant "xx" as a specific instance, like "||" and "-AT_SYMBOL-@". "2" is a
> notation
> for the class of all pairs or some such abstraction.
Mmmh... I disagree. The class of all pairs is only a representation (an
implementation would say a computer scientist) of the number 2 in a
theory of sets (actually it is the definition by Russell and nobody
uses it: set theorist nowadays represents 2 as {{}{{}}} = {0,1}.
I would say the "real" platonic number two is beyond any
representation. What 2 really *is*?. Nobody knows, nobody cares. The
axiomatic method has been invented for not being perturbed by
such questions.
Bruno
Truth is needed for justice,
justice is needed for peace,
peace is needed for education,
education is needed for truth.
http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/
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Received on Thu Aug 17 2006 - 06:23:52 PDT