I think the pre inflation era was an era of a kind of time that is characteristic for virtual particles. They don't move forward nor backwards in time but oscillate. That state, present on a 3D Planckian volume residing on a 4D bulk space (which with it can gravitationally interact, somewhat like the Randall-Sundrum model, explaining the weakness of gravity), is set in motion not by an internal breaking of symmetry (symmetry breaking has no place in this model) but by an external condition that exceeds a critical value: the negative curvature of the bulk space on which two 3D branes (universe and its mirror version) can
inflate into real existence.

Quarks can't be asymptotically free. Only when together they can move freely.

What's a cognitive leap whopper?

A cognitive-leap whopper is a conclusion that might be correct, but is based upon on a small volume of evidence and needs much more evidence to start becoming probitive.

If universe is non- mathematical, how does this impact status of applied math? Huge question that needs answering by your claim.

There's something external to the Big Bang singularity?

but the universe was/had to be mathematical before we learned how to describe it, no? — Agent Smith

No, it was only describable. Then math was invented to help describe it.

Do you know you're entangling mental objects with physical objects? I suspect your premise here is rooted in subjective materialism. — ucarr

Do you think that math cannot be applied to non material objects. I had two dreams last night and three the day before.

Holy shit!!! Non material things are mathematical as well. OR NOT.

I suspect you have no idea how to continue proving your point so you are trying to confuse the topic.

Are you okay with science reverted back to the period before the scientific method? — ucarr

Apart from the fact that it is a bloody stupid question, how do you think my answer would help you to prove that the universe is mathematical?

You are the one that has stated that mathematics was clearly a part of the universe before humans existed, therefore the universe is mathematical. Exactly what proof have you offered?

If universe is non- mathematical, how does this impact status of applied math? — ucarr

Mankind will have to find another way to describe the universe and they will chuck applied math out of the window as obsolete.

Your central point is that numbers do not exist in the material world, apart from human mind inventing them, then using mind to count material things, right?

Recently, you've said material things are countable. So, if numbers are not a physical attribute of a material thing, and yet numbers, which are of the mind only, can count material things, then the counting of material things by mental numbers is mixing a mental thing with a physical thing, subjective materialism (Berkley).

Bear in mind, numbers as symbols must have a material thing as their referent, if they are to keep separate from material identity, otherwise, you're mixing the two.

Do you think that math cannot be applied to non material objects. — Sir2u

Following from your claim numbers are purely mental, non-material things are the only things they can count without becoming entangled with the material world.

Are you okay with science reverted back to the period before the scientific method?
— ucarr
Apart from the fact that it is a bloody stupid question, how do you think my answer would help you to prove that the universe is mathematical? — Sir2u

It's not a stupid question because the lynchpin of modern science is the belief that the physical attributes of material objects persist in the absence of sentience naming them. The three pillars of the scientific method, as you know, are public, repeatable, measurable. If the state of material things were dependent upon sentience naming them, as you claim with numbers, material things would forever be shape-shifting like mad in accordance with the many points of view of various individuals. Material things are measureable to a standard because their attributes don't change under the influence of sentience, which means said attributes are independent of sentience.

No, it was only describable. — Sir2u

You mean to say the universe wasn't mathematical before humans got here? The earth was not revolving around the sun in an elliptical orbit determined by the mathematical laws of gravity before humans came into existence!? :chin:

I'm sorry, I don't follow.

:point:

I think the pre inflation era was an era of a kind of time that is characteristic for virtual particles. They don't move forward nor backwards in time but oscillate. — EugeneW

:up:

So the math never describes exactly and at most approximations can be made. — EugeneW

Okay ...

Which simply means no exact structures exist.

O ... kay :chin:

Which means they don't exist at all.

I can't follow this leap. Explain how you get to "no exact structures exist" and from there to "they don't exist at all".

Being countable is part of the makeup, part of the being of material things.
— ucarr

Could that something that makes them countable be their presence? — Sir2u

Here's where things get interesting because what you have written above is a full, unconditional affirmation of what I've been claiming from the start.

Yes! The physical presence of material things is what makes them countable, and the language of math does the counting; it does not create or ascribe to material things their countability. The countability of material things, as you say above, is their physical presence.

In a world without material things, I suppose pure math could busy itself with the counting of abstract numbers. Of what use would that be? Might it serve as a Buddhist chant that aids in calming the mind for the sake of meditation? I say this because the counting of abstract numbers without referents is a vacuous circularity.

Mankind will have to find another way to describe the universe and they will chuck applied math out of the window as obsolete. — Sir2u

Why should applied math, that works in the real world, be chucked out the window? While it's true that Einstein physics has superseded Newton physics to some extent, the world still uses Newton physics everyday to great advantage.

So, if numbers are not a physical attribute of a material thing, and yet numbers, which are of the mind only, can count material things, then the counting of material things by mental numbers is mixing a mental thing with a physical thing, — ucarr

Not subjective materialism, but philosophical dualism. The rational intelligence, nous, recognises numbers and forms, among other attributes, which are among the qualities which make material things intelligible.

“EVERYTHING in the cosmic universe is composed of matter and form. Everything is concrete and individual. Hence the forms of cosmic entities must also be concrete and individual. Now, the process of knowledge is immediately concerned with the separation of form from matter, since a thing is known precisely because its form is received in the knower. But, whatever is received is in the recipient according to the mode of being that the recipient possesses. If, then, the senses are material powers, they receive the forms of objects in a material manner; and if the intellect is an immaterial power, it receives the forms of objects in an immaterial manner. This means that in the case of sense knowledge, the form is still encompassed with the concrete characters which make it particular; and that, in the case of intellectual knowledge, the form is disengaged from all such characters. To understand is to free form completely from matter. — Brennan, Thomistic Psychology

This is the closest you've come to saying something philosophically interesting in this thread.

If an exact structure can't be described exactly, it doesn't exist. Otherwise you could describe it exactly.

How do you know it's "an exact structure" if it "can't be described exactly"? You're just begging the question (i.e. it's so because I say so" à la Humpty Dumpty). :roll: Maybe try again addressing the two-part question I actually asked.

The fact that it can't be described exactly just means there isn't an exact structure. If the exact structure is the approximation then what is the exact structures? And what it approximates? There are many possible approximations.

The fact that it can't be described exactly just means there isn't an exact structure. — EugeneW

No. "The fact that it can't be described" only implies that it hasn't been described yet (either by you or maybe anyone). For instance, the ocean floors of Earth could not be mapped until the 20th c, yet the ocean floors have existed for billions of years before they were mapped.

The fact that God hasn't showed himself only means he hasn't showed himself yet...

Not subjective materialism, but philosophical dualism. The rational intelligence, nous, recognises numbers and forms, among other attributes, which are among the qualities which make material things intelligible.

“EVERYTHING in the cosmic universe is composed of matter and form. Everything is concrete and individual. Hence the forms of cosmic entities must also be concrete and individual. Now, the process of knowledge is immediately concerned with the separation of form from matter, since a thing is known precisely because its form is received in the knower. But, whatever is received is in the recipient according to the mode of being that the recipient possesses. If, then, the senses are material powers, they receive the forms of objects in a material manner; and if the intellect is an immaterial power, it receives the forms of objects in an immaterial manner. This means that in the case of sense knowledge, the form is still encompassed with the concrete characters which make it particular; and that, in the case of intellectual knowledge, the form is disengaged from all such characters. To understand is to free form completely from matter.
— Brennan, Thomistic Psychology — Wayfarer

Breaking this down,

EVERYTHING in the cosmic universe is composed of matter and form. Everything is concrete and individual. Hence the forms of cosmic entities must also be concrete and individual.

Is Brennan herein referring to the (individual) gods? Are you polytheist? Do you hold with the premise monotheism is false?

the process of knowledge is immediately concerned with the separation of form from matter

Do you hold that such separation is empirically literal, or do you have an understanding such a separation is a benign procedural fiction of the reasoning mind? I ask this because form and matter in separation (to me) seem to be unintelligible. This bifurcation gives the reasoning mind a stronger handle on what it's trying to understand, however, we don't see such separation in our everyday world, do we?

whatever is received is in the recipient according to the mode of being that the recipient possesses.

So, humans are a mixture of the material & the immaterial i.e., a mixture of form & content? If so, this tells us humans encompass a brain/mind bifurcation. This leads us to a crucial question for the immaterialist: How do the material & the immaterial {connect, interface, bridge} to form a common ground and what does such common ground look like?

Might it be the case QM has some answers to this question?

To understand is to free form completely from matter.

Do you experience purely abstract thought without material imagery acting as a supporting substrate making it intelligible?

I'm inclined to think the easy, discrete separation of matter & form is a useful fiction, but a fiction nonetheless.

The fact that God hasn't showed himself only means he hasn't showed himself yet... — EugeneW

Before the 20th century, ocean floors were public, repeatable, measurable i.e., subject to scientific examination & description.

From antiquity until now, God, by definition, transcends the material.

Since science has entered into the 4D realms of spacetime & QM, further expansion in 4D might lead to an upward dimensionality of materialism that includes a 4D empirical God consciousness (which is not God) that might well serve organized religion.

In light of the above statement, the premise God consciousness has no 4D empirical existence is, in my opinion, not a well-supported conclusion.

The fact that it can't be described exactly just means there isn't an exact structure. If the exact structure is the approximation then what is the exact structures? And what it approximates? There are many possible approximations. — EugeneW

Is someone rushing to judgment about boundary ontology?

Where's the argument, supported by evidence (Hadron Super-Collider), that the boundary ontology of, say, elementary particles, must be exact & discreet in order to be extant?

Action-at-a-distance of elementary particles raises questions about existing boundary ontology being simple, exact & discreet.

Likewise the event horizon of black holes>likewise the holographic theory of the universe.

Likewise dark matter.

Likewise the 2nd law of thermodynamics being preserved within black holes.

Is someone rushing to judgment about boundary ontology? — ucarr

What judgement is there to be made?

Where's the argument, supported by evidence (Hadron Super-Collider), that the boundary ontology of, say, elementary particles, must be exact & discreet in order to be extant? — ucarr

What's the boundary ontology of elementary particles? They are only supposed to be asymptotically free.

Action-at-a-distance of elementary particles raises questions about existing boundary ontology being simple, exact & discreet. — ucarr

Which questions?

Likewise the event horizon of black holes>likewise the holographic theory of the universe.

Likewise dark matter.

Likewise the 2nd law of thermodynamics being preserved within black holes. — ucarr

Likewise in being simple, exact, and discrete?

:rofl:

What judgment is there to be made? -- EugeneW

Consider, an approximation is such in relation to another thing it resembles, as a kind of isotope, or variant. As a thing in itself, it's just another thing, no less extant than the other thing it resembles.

Should we reverse engineer our thinking about the applied math models that seem to fit real things, like bridges? Is engineering a fiction that, by luck, happens to work, through no rational intent of engineering science?

Is acceleration due to gravity a fiction?

What's the pivotal evidence that all of the universe is non-mathematical, not just some of it?

Yes. My examples are supposed to show non-discrete, real boundaries, or unknown boundaries, yet to be mapped mathematically.

What's the pivotal evidence that all of the universe is non-mathematical, not just some of it? — ucarr

I think the evidence is that we don't see perfect mathematical structures. Plato delegated them to a mathematical extramundane world, from where they are projected as shadows, I think we project math from the mind to the physical world and in some situations, when asked in mathematical language, the physical world answer in a back mathematically, but in most cases she doesn't have an answer.

Is Brennan herein referring to the (individual) gods? — ucarr

Not 'gods' - individual particular things. Whatever you see, any object or being, is a combination of matter and form.

Do you hold that such separation is empirically literal, or do you have an understanding such a separation is a benign procedural fiction of the reasoning mind? I ask this because form and matter in separation (to me) seem to be unintelligible. This bifurcation gives the reasoning mind a stronger handle on what it's trying to understand, however, we don't see such separation in our everyday world, do we? — ucarr

I think we do - because that is how the mind recognises and classifies things. Whenever you see an object, there's an immediate chain reaction of apperception, assimilation, and recognition - this is going on all of the time. If you loose that functionality you literally couldn't make sense of experience - like that Oliver Sachs book The Man who Mistook his Wife for a Hat. (I think the technical term is 'agnosia'.)

This type of 'matter-form' dualism goes back to Aristotle and ultimately to Plato. It is derived from the understanding of the platonic Ideas or Forms. The very rough drift is that individual particulars are always a composite of form and matter - but the Aristotelian notion of 'matter' is different to the modern. It is more like 'unformed chaos', which is brought into being by bring 'impressed with form' (as a seal is impressed on wax).

Of course it's true that a great deal of Aristotelian philosophy was abandoned in the transition to modernity, chiefly due to the very great deficiencies of Aristotelian physics, which was demolished by Galileo. But some elements of Aristotle's metaphysics, such as 'hylo-morphism' (matter-formism) have made a comeback.

The basic idea behind that Brennan quote is that the senses 'receive' the sensory data from a particular, but the mind (nous) recognises the form or idea or principle of the particular, and that rational knowing is always a combination of these two elements, the sensory with the intellectual.

It goes some way to addressing your concern with whether numbers must always have material representation, I think. That's because the operation of the intellect is purely rational, it is concerned only with ideas, which are immaterial in essence. But where Aristotle departed from Plato, is that Plato held that the ideas have real existence in their own right, whereas Aristotle said they were real only when they were instantiated in material form. (That is called 'moderate realism'. There's an Aeon article about Aristotelian realism here and another article which discusses Platonic realism in relation to maths here.)

I'm sorry, I don't follow. — Agent Smith

Look at your favorite coffee mug, now describe it. You use words to describe right? Did it have the properties you used before you described it or did they come into being when you did it? Now imagine try to describe something without the words to do it. Impossible right?

That is what math does. Describes the properties of things using numbers instead of words.

Here's where things get interesting because what you have written above is a full, unconditional affirmation of what I've been claiming from the start. — ucarr

Could you just go back to the OP and point out exactly where you stated that. No, don't bother.

You are repeating yourself using different words but saying the same thing. I doubt that anyone has any possibility of change your way of thinking and you have no way of changing anyone else's. The argument has been running for years with advancing at all.

One last question. You don't have to answer.
If mankind had never invented and renovated and updated mathematics to fit into the little bit of the universe that it actually manages to describe reasonably well, would we be stuck with describing it as a very big colorful place with lots of stuff floating around?
My answer would be yes, because math has nothing to do with the universe. It is just the method of describing the properties. We would still be able to describe a lot of the properties because ordinary langue suffices for that.

Look at your favorite coffee mug, now describe it. You use words to describe right? Did it have the properties you used before you described it or did they come into being when you did it? Now imagine try to describe something without the words to do it. Impossible right?

That is what math does. Describes the properties of things using numbers instead of words. — Sir2u

Indeed, description is only possible once we develop the language to do it with and math is a language, but more too.

When and if I invent a language, the words, their definitions, can't be arbitrary i.e. if I coin a word and define it as I please, the properties listed in my definition will not/should not magically appear in the world. Will it/should it? The words "leprechaun", "elf", "fairy" are such kinds of words - their extension is empty. If math were invented, many of the concepts in it would be similarly affected - they would not apply to the real world.

math has nothing to do with the universe. It is just the method of describing the properties. — Sir2u

If, as you say, "math has nothing to do with the universe," and, as you say, "It is just the method of describing the properties." then, by your own words, the properties described by math must belong to the material things and not to math. As you've said earlier, these material properties include length, width, height, weight, etc. So, math describes these physical properties of material things that are external to math.

Let's look at the two statements below.

First, I make a claim about material things,

Being countable is part of the makeup, part of the being of material things. — ucarr

then you elaborate what I assert with an additional detail.

Could that something that makes them countable be their presence? — Sir2u

Now, let's look again at what you said just before> math describes the properties of material things i.e., length, width, height, weight, etc. Let's remember you also said "math has nothing to do with the universe," and thus we conclude these properties are external to math.

Let us now assemble the physical properties of material things external to math. When we assemble length, width, height, weight, etc., what do we get?

We get PRESENCE. You know as well as I do that a material thing that possesses the properties just described has presence within the real world of material things.

Now, let's look again at your most important statement in this discussion,

Could that something that makes them countable be their presence? — Sir2u

I know you don't think math bestows upon material things the physical properties listed above because you've just said, "math has nothing to do with the universe. It is just the method of describing the properties."

So, if math doesn't bestow physical properties upon material things, and these physical properties add up to presence then, the presence of material things is likewise independent of math.

Therefore, given that presence is independent of math, and presence, by your own words, is that something that makes material things countable, then, by the transitive property, the countability of material things is also independent of math.

The logic here is airtight, is it not?

When and if I invent a language, the words, their definitions, can't be arbitrary i.e. if I coin a word and define it as I please, the properties listed in my definition will not/should not magically appear in the world.

The words "leprechaun", "elf", "fairy" are such kinds of words - their extension is empty. — Agent Smith

Ask almost anyone to describe a leprechaun or an elf, maybe even an angel. I bet they can do it.

These are words that are used to describe things, whether concrete or abstract. Math is used to describe the properties of the universe and uses words such as inches, meters, degrees, numbers. None of which appear magically in the world but all are just as "real" as a faerie.

The logic here is airtight, is it not? — ucarr

PSsssssssssssssss. :smirk:

Ask almost anyone to describe a leprechaun or an elf, maybe even an angel. I bet they can do it.

These are words that are used to describe things, whether concrete or abstract. Math is used to describe the properties of the universe and uses words such as inches, meters, degrees, numbers. None of which appear magically in the world but all are just as "real" as a faerie. — Sir2u

I'm not sure. Are we talking past each other?

An invention, in my view, is essentially imagination based. Ergo, what's invented needn't correspond to reality (unicorns, leprechauns, fairies don't exist). If math were also an invention, the same would be true - nothing mathematical would have any physical correlate so to speak.

This, however, isn't the case. Mathematical objects do correspond to things in the real world (mathematical theories in physics). This has to mean something; it can't be ignored, oui?