Is math a science?

Zigmen · #1 by **Zigmen** » Jul 06, 2010 4:55 pm

My mother was a math professor and I remember when her department got moved out of the science building.

"Math is not a science," was the rationale behind the move, "it's a tool."

My dad was a scientist, and I remember his saying to my mother, "tell them that they should remove the math department from the science building as soon as they promise to stop using math in their science courses."

That was pretty funny, I thought.

But then it occured to me that the science department also spoke English. Was the English language a part of science as well? Or was it just a tool?

Anyway. Is math a science? Or is it a tool?

Shrunk · #2 by **Shrunk** » Jul 06, 2010 5:03 pm

I would say it is not a science. To my thinking, science depends on corroboration by empirical data to confirm its ideas. Math stands on its own without reference to external reality.

I'm sure there's a more rigorous and erudite way to word that.

rJD · #3 by **rJD** » Jul 06, 2010 5:07 pm

Zigmen wrote:But then it occured to me that the science department also spoke English. Was the English language a part of science as well? Or was it just a tool?

Anyway. Is math a science? Or is it a tool?

Maths (I'm English :grin:

) can also be described as a language.

HughMcB · #4 by **HughMcB** » Jul 06, 2010 5:12 pm

I don't think math is a science as it relies on no empirical cross-reference, or even physical reality for that matter.

I'll still call it a science however. :grin:

Preno · #5 by **Preno** » Jul 06, 2010 6:09 pm

It's not a science, but that in no way implies that it's "just a tool".

Zigmen · #6 by **Zigmen** » Jul 06, 2010 6:15 pm

Thanks for the answers, folks.

So, is it sort of like a tomato being considered a vegetable, even though it is technically a fruit?

Do we like to call math a science even it isn't?

I wonder why . . .

campermon · #7 by **campermon** » Jul 06, 2010 6:16 pm

HughMcB wrote:

I'll still call it a science however.

Oh no it's not!!!

*best pantomime voice*

twistor59 · #8 by **twistor59** » Jul 06, 2010 6:33 pm

If you're a platonist I suppose you might consider it a science - discovering platonic truths that have an existence independent of the physical universe.

I'm not - for me maths is a methodology.

Cor the Holland players look really orange tonight.

shh · #9 by **shh** » Jul 06, 2010 6:40 pm

Zigmen wrote:Thanks for the answers, folks.

So, is it sort of like a tomato being considered a vegetable, even though it is technically a fruit?

Do we like to call math a science even it isn't?

I wonder why . . .

Depends who "we" are, I don't, for starters.
As far as I can tell, most people who do like to call it science do so because (around here at least) they also refuse to believe in anything unscientific, and maths is completely unscientific.
Except Hugh, any greek philosopher who owns an x-wing and posts in a thread on 21st century Earth can call it whatever they goddamn like.

Paul Almond · **#10** by **Paul Almond** » Jul 06, 2010 7:51 pm

Can someone give an example of a mathematical insight which can be gained without setting up a physical system in some state and then seeing what it does, along with a (brief) description of how the insight is gained? - and I suggest that anyone about to answer this is very, very careful and reflects on what is really happening when brains of any kind think or computers of any kind compute things.

I also suggest that the notion of "external reality" as a profound concept, as if there is some profound, ontological difference between what happens inside the brain and what happens outside it, should be questioned. Both involve physical processes. The processes inside your brain tend to be more accessible to other processes in your brain than things that are outside your brain, but that is largely a matter of degree. (and no - this doesn't mean that I think if someone has some idea that sky lizards exist, in their brain, that this is as useful as a "real" sky lizard observation: We know that what happens in brains does not always reflect the rest of reality very well.)

Ickypedia · **#11** by **Ickypedia** » Jul 06, 2010 8:13 pm

rJD wrote:
Zigmen wrote:But then it occured to me that the science department also spoke English. Was the English language a part of science as well? Or was it just a tool?

Anyway. Is math a science? Or is it a tool?

Maths (I'm English ) can also be described as a language.

Bollocks, that! I've a knack for languages, yet I am incompetent when it comes to maths. Refuted.

trevp · **#12** by **trevp** » Jul 06, 2010 8:16 pm

In the UK, even the Universities don't seem to know the answer to this one. Some award BA degrees for maths, others give BSc degrees and some give combined BA/BSc degrees. :scratch:

debunk · **#13** by **debunk** » Jul 06, 2010 8:48 pm

rJD wrote:
Zigmen wrote:But then it occured to me that the science department also spoke English. Was the English language a part of science as well? Or was it just a tool?

Anyway. Is math a science? Or is it a tool?

Maths (I'm English ) can also be described as a language.

r.c · **#14** by **r.c** » Jul 06, 2010 9:03 pm

debunk wrote:
rJD wrote:
Zigmen wrote:But then it occured to me that the science department also spoke English. Was the English language a part of science as well? Or was it just a tool?

Anyway. Is math a science? Or is it a tool?

Maths (I'm English ) can also be described as a language.

I don't think maths can be compared to language. Language is used to convey an idea/message etc. where as maths itself is the idea.

newolder · **#15** by **newolder** » Jul 06, 2010 9:05 pm

You might find this +plus magazine article of interest.

Gregory Chaitin wrote:To put it bluntly, if the incompleteness phenomenon discovered by Gödel in 1931 is really serious — and I believe that Turing's work and my own work suggest that incompleteness is much more serious than people think — then perhaps mathematics should be pursued somewhat more in the spirit of experimental science rather than always demanding proofs for everything. Maybe, rather than attempting to prove results such as the celebrated Riemann hypothesis, mathematicians should accept that they may not be provable and simply accept them as an axiom.

At any rate, that's the way things seem to me. Perhaps by the time we reach the centenary of Turing's death in 2054, this quasi-empirical view will have made some headway, or perhaps instead these foreign ideas will be utterly rejected by the immune system of the maths community. For now they certainly are rejected. But the past fifty years have brought us many surprises, and I expect that the next fifty years will too, a great many indeed.

Maths as experimental science has no real barriers.

debunk · **#16** by **debunk** » Jul 06, 2010 9:12 pm

r.c wrote:
debunk wrote:
rJD wrote:
Zigmen wrote:But then it occured to me that the science department also spoke English. Was the English language a part of science as well? Or was it just a tool?

Anyway. Is math a science? Or is it a tool?

Maths (I'm English ) can also be described as a language.

I don't think maths can be compared to language. Language is used to convey an idea/message etc. where as maths itself is the idea.

Mathematics has grammar, jargon, symbols (as in notation), pretty much every attribute we ascribe to languages.

katja z · **#17** by **katja z** » Jul 06, 2010 9:14 pm

r.c wrote:
I don't think maths can be compared to language. Language is used to convey an idea/message etc. where as maths itself is the idea.

Well, as to that, language is not just a vehicle for ideas, the relation is much more convoluted than that (can an idea be had without a language?). It is a semiotic (signifying) system, and I suspect the same could be said of mathematics?

ETA: Oh, I see I've been beaten to it. :cheers:

newolder · **#18** by **newolder** » Jul 06, 2010 9:16 pm

debunk wrote:
r.c wrote:
debunk wrote:
rJD wrote:
Zigmen wrote:But then it occured to me that the science department also spoke English. Was the English language a part of science as well? Or was it just a tool?

Anyway. Is math a science? Or is it a tool?

Maths (I'm English ) can also be described as a language.

I don't think maths can be compared to language. Language is used to convey an idea/message etc. where as maths itself is the idea.

Mathematics has grammar, jargon, symbols (as in notation), pretty much every attribute we ascribe to languages.

Yes, as noted earlier by Galileo:

"Philosophy is written in this grand book - I mean the Universe - which stands continually open to our gaze, but it cannot be understood unless one first learns to comprehend the language and interpret the characters in which it is written. It is written in the language of mathematics, and its characters are triangles, circles and other geometrical figures, without which it is humanly impossible to understand a single word of it."

shh · **#19** by **shh** » Jul 06, 2010 11:33 pm

Paul Almond wrote:Can someone give an example of a mathematical insight which can be gained without setting up a physical system in some state and then seeing what it does, along with a (brief) description of how the insight is gained? - and I suggest that anyone about to answer this is very, very careful and reflects on what is really happening when brains of any kind think or computers of any kind compute things.

I think this is misleading, no-one's ever described how insight is gained in any circumstance ever to my knowledge, no one knows what's going on in a mind at this level, and computer calculations are irrelevant, they're simply reacting to leverage, they're not doing maths in the relevant sense.
Added to this, the question seems to be (at base) whether or not a person without any sensory experience could invent maths, I'd say no, but that's irrelevant to whether or not maths is empirical.

shh · **#20** by **shh** » Jul 06, 2010 11:37 pm

r.c wrote:I don't think maths can be compared to language. Language is used to convey an idea/message etc. where as maths itself is the idea.

I have no idea what this means.

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