Hi all,
I am rather busy finishing my (french, alas again) paper on the debate
between the french biologist J.P. Changeux and the french mathematician
Alain Connes.
Actually the book has been translated:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0691004056/wwwlink-software-21/202-7192216-8003069
Changeux is a materialist elimininativist. He believes in monistic
materialism. Mathematics, according to him, is exclusively a construction
of the human brain.
Connes is platonist for mathematical truth, but seems to accept some form
of physical realism, so that he accepts a form of platonistic dualism (an
invention of Aristotle, not Plato: it is the position of realism with
respect to both math and physics). Connes acknowledges that his position
entails the mystery of the relation between math and physics (the
unreasonable effectiveness of math in physics). Obviously the comp hyp can
reconcile them, but at the price of dismissing physical realism. I
recommend the book. It makes clear the inevitability of a clash between two
forms of realism in science. It is also interesting that Connes uses the
term of "bifurcation" both in relation with Everett's quantum mechanics and
Godel's theorem; that's a point which is made utterly clear in the comp
approach I follow for the fundamental questions.
I hope also you have been able to buy the little and cheap book "Forever
Undecided" by Smullyan, which
has been re-edited recently, but seems to be again out of print. I will
make some critical comments about it soon. I definitely consider that book
as a royal introduction to the modal logic G, which, as you (should) know
is the basic material on which the technical comp derivation of physics is
extracted. (Well the beginning of the derivation, of course ...). Be sure
you have no more problem with the Universal Dovetailer Argument, and please
don't hesitate to send last minute objections ;)
Bruno
http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/
Received on Fri Jun 18 2004 - 10:44:58 PDT