<p>Those things aren’t part of nature, they’re mental tools to help us understand and do things. If you’re part of the crowd that believes that mathematics isn’t really nature but a tool used by us to understand how nature works, then this will make sense to you in an easy to understand example: you can pick up two chickens, two pens, two sticks, but you cannot pick up the number two, so if you can’t really do anything with it, is it really part of nature?</p>
<p>I see what you’re trying to say now. But that’s diving into philosophy… something that you can’t really prove. The debate I mentioned, about mathematics being part of nature or just a tool made up by us, is one that has been around for a long time. No one can say that this is correct or isn’t correct. Or you could simply be defining 'things differently, which is why we have different schools of thought in philosophy. So… a mindless debate really.</p>
<p>You really should be more clear about what you’re trying to say, and I have a little bit of confidence in saying that since I think a few others didn’t quite understand either.</p>
<p>If you think about it though… mathematics is what is truly underlying physics… so you could say THAT explains nature completely. But again we’d be going into what is nature and how you define it and why a mentality or instinct is or isn’t part of nature. We’d be going in circles… we’ve already been going in circles actually…</p>
<p>I was clear about my point from the very first post; my very first post encompasses all of my post #139 down into a single sentence: “It is the science of natural phenomenon, not necessarily of nature itself.” “Not necessarily” is a phrase of non-absolution and was intentionally used so. </p>
<p>Though, I do concur that I may have come off as not so clear, but not because I wasn’t clear in what I was trying to say - I was clear - , however rather because every time there was a tangential point made that I disagreed with, and there were many, I called out, which resulted in confusion as to exactly what my initial point was. </p>
<p>physics doesn’t reduce to mathematics. you couldn’t just sit in an empty room, do a really long math problem, ‘derive’ the laws of physics, and hope that they are anything close to being correct. </p>
<p>the math in physics is just a way to express relationships–there’s nothing meaningful in the mathematical formalism itself. the meaning in the fundamental laws of physics comes from experimental results. </p>
<p>for physicists, the goal is to describe how the world works, not to build elaborate frameworks which may not have anything to do with real life. mathematicians, applied & not, don’t have to worry about that.</p>
<p>I’m being lame about this, but strictly speaking, I don’t think that this makes sense. A mathematical theory tells you nothing about how the world works. It can talk about numbers, sets, functions, spaces or whatever. It says nothing about matter & light or how the world works. </p>
<p>Physics theorists choose what mathematical formalisms to apply to physics problems. My guess is that sometimes they have to develop new mathematics to describe whatever it is that they want to describe, but the real content of their job is figuring out what mathematics to apply to a particular situation. </p>
<p>if you meant that in QM there are cases where the physics theory predicted something before it was measured, then yeah, probably that’s true.</p>
<p>but the beginnings of the theory were grounded in experiment. as far as i know, the schrodinger eqn. was concocted so that it was consistent with various facts that were found experimentally (E=hf, p=hk, etc).</p>
<p>Sounds like a bunch of people just sitting around trying to find mathematically consistent ways to describe the universe without first actually observing such phenomena. I don’t think anyone is suggesting that the formalisms of pure math actually physically exist, but they seem to be a good means of extrapolating complex descriptions of reality and coming up with testable theories about the nature of reality.</p>
<p>Edit for clarification: One could perhaps see mathematics as the “language of nature.” I think this is what hadsed means by math underlying “physics.” Or, philosophically…who is to say that reality is not a description of mathematics?</p>
<p>whatever. only until einstein took his result and corroborated it with experimental evidence, did planck’s result become important. planck himself admitted that he thought his photon idea was just a formalism–a way to resolve the fact that cavities don’t radiate an infinite amount of power. he didn’t think that the photon actually existed.</p>
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<p>They didn’t dream up these things though, these ideas were motivated by things that were observed–the photoelectric effect, cavities don’t radiate an infinite amount of power, the discrete spectra of hydrogen, etc.</p>
<p>Yes, sometime theorists predict things before they are measured. I overstated the case for QM–actually E=hf and p=hk predated the experiments confirming both, but those hypotheses only became a big deal when the experiments confirmed it. You don’t hear too much about the failed theories in science class . . . </p>
<p>However, theorists aren’t smart enough to determine how the world works purely by reason and introspection. Physics without experiment would be full of bs. Physics is not math. It isn’t derived from math. That was my point. I was pedantic about how you were using your words, because I think a lot of people (maybe not/not necessarily you) don’t understand that. </p>
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<p>you could see this i guess, but it has nothing to do with doing science proper and more to do with how you decide philosophically to interpret its results.</p>
<p>usually the guys on the internet who j/o over science (atheists) have a philosophy incompatible with this view anyway.</p>
<p>Eh, that question was just random speculation. I think we agree more or less, so I don’t wish to continue this discussion much further; my point was just that it is apparently possible (however unlikely) to come up with a theory that fairly accurately (to our knowledge) describes reality using math before ever proving the theory experimentally. Yes, the theory would not be scientifically meaningful if it could not be proved experimentally, but there would be no basis for conducting said experiments without some reasonably, mathematically derived theory already in place. You ostensibly argued that it was impossible to come up with a rational theory that accurately describes reality before that theory was experimentally tested.</p>
<p>What I tried to say is that there’s no way in hell that someone can derive physics a priori. the greeks tried this and they sucked at physics. physics isn’t just one huge math problem.</p>
<p>Well clearly you can predict what might happen by developing theories before experiments. This is what theoretical physicists do really… well not all of it, but sometimes they happen to deduce a theory before any experimental evidence. However, what silence_kit is trying to highlight is the fact that we MUST use experimental evidence still to prove what is happening, otherwise it’s not really science. This is where the controversy with string theorists arises… are they philosophers, mathematicians, or scientists? Many consider them to be only the first two and hardly the third. However, people have no place saying that because we have no idea if string theory can be or will be provable someday for one, and because their ideas are not completely abstract (they still define things in the natural world).</p>
<p>Perhaps you could come up with an equation to describe the universe, but without physics to really tell you what it means… what does it really mean? Without it it’s just a meaningless bunch of cool looking pictures.</p>
<p>To my knowledge, this is what many physicists do. They derive a new theory from existing theories, and in the hope that their theory is true, test it. In a number of cases this has worked, so I do not feel that silence_kit’s statement is entirely correct. It is of course clear to me that a purely rational approach to truths in physics is not consistent with the primarily empirical nature of science.</p>
<p>they don’t ‘derive’ their theory from existing theories or from some cosmic truth–they pick it based on concerns from experiments and existing theories established by experiments. there isn’t some cosmic truth that physicists tap into from which they can reason about how the world works without actually looking at how the world works. </p>
<p>Sorry to bump this thread but I found it quite interesting! I’m currently a freshman in college and have sort of been freaking out about my ultimate major choice. Honestly, if I was really great at math and/or science I would look into engineering, physics, bio, computer science, etc. However, I am only “good” at those subjects (not great), and they definitely do not interest me enough to major in. </p>
<p>If you are truly passionate about something and are incredibly determined to pursue that field, shouldn’t you major in it? I have a passion for broadcast journalism (because I’m not ignorant in realizing that newspaper journalism is going down the tubes, and I’m far more drawn to television broadcasting anyway). I’m also very interested in a lot of aspects that come with business majors, but I have no idea which one I would be best at. It just worries me when people say that these are “soft” majors, in particular broadcast journ! I’ve been researching a lot, taking “college major tests”, and talking to a bunch of people; most people tell me to pursue what I am most passionate about, but I also want to be successful. Any feedback/opinions?</p>
<p>Well if you want to be the guy reporting the news then you need two qualities: very presentable (good looking one!), and clear articulation.</p>
<p>If you want to be the one behind the scence - meaning doing the research and writing, then as long as you are a great writer and you are interested in the field then you are good.</p>
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Well I don’t know how many positions are open every year for bradocast journalism. But consider there are local and national broadcast media in the nation… and these days you also have Internet broadcast, I don’t think the field is bad at all. But don’t rely on me because I have no idea about this industry at all.</p>
<p>As a student I think being passionate is necessary to be successful. Now if you want to become a billionaire obviously the chance is improbable from the broadcast journalism. You can become one of those top talkers on the TV shows, but seriously how many?</p>
<p>I always believe that in order to become successful you need 30% of luck, 30% of interest, and 40% of effort. </p>
<p>You still have time to make up your mind - I know it sucks when you decide to change major, or career path post-graduation. But that’s how life is. </p>