I think the better explanation is that Israel / US simply have no practical way to defeat Iran.

They've been in a delusional driven genocide with constant escalation to try to distract from the Genocide internationally (new enemies to continue to be the victim) and also maintain credibility domestically of being the superior race that can go around killing all their enemies. — boethius

The US politicians are just in the pocket of the Israel lobby thanks to mainly the Pro-Israeli Christians in the electorate, not just the American Jewish community. It's quite obvious that the US doesn't want the kind of "final solution" which the Netanyahu government hopes it can do somehow. These things take a lot of time to change, but I think they are changing.

But do notice that you have two different administrations and states here.

The spell of invincibility broke between due to Iran's missile attack demonstrating Israeli air defence doesn't work so well (so Iran can cause significant damage conventionally) and also the pentagon simply having no plan to actually defeat Iran (Israel overconfidence likely includes overconfidence in US capacity as well). — boethius

I have to agree with you. Those missiles hitting Nevatim Air base really were hitting Nevatim air base. And the US is in no position to occupy Iran.

Nuclear weapons hinder the pace of going up the escalatory ladder, but they don't keep states from fighting each other ...as long as the fighting is "limited" in scale. Argentina could attack easily the UK as there really was no threat of a nuclear mushroom cloud engulfing Buenos Aires. The UK wouldn't use nukes to defend few inhabitants and sheep in the Falklands. Also Pakistan and India could have a border war even with nuclear arms on both sides. And North and South Korea can engage in firefights then and now.

Hence the unfortunate reality is that it would be logical now for Iran to get it's nuclear weapon. The US will attack only nations that have potential nuclear weapons, but not a large and dispersed nuclear deterrent. That's why it's totally possible that Iran does have few nukes already.

Most of us seem to agree Trump is winning as things stand, me, Mikie, the betting markets, Nate SIlver etc. — Baden

Yeah, Trump will probably win. :meh:

Hopefully I'm wrong.

And it's likely going to be worse than last time, because now he can demand to be surrounded by yes-men. Not like he will take a lot of generals into his cabinet, which naturally don't veer off from US policy where it has been on since WW2. He'll bring on people that he took on the last years of his prior administration.

Lame duck president for four years?

There are levels of 'controlled by'. I mean, in one sense, most machines still run code written by humans, similar to how our brains are effectively machines with all these physical connections between primitive and reasonably understood primitives. In another sense, machines are being programmed to learn, and what they learn and how that knowledge is applied is not in the control of the programmers, so both us and the machine do things unanticipated. How they've evolved seems to have little to do with this basic layered control mechanism. — noAxioms

Yet the issue here is that they have to have in their program instructions how to learn, how even to rewrite the algorithms they are following. And that's the problem with the order for a computer "do something else". It has to have instructions just what to do.

A decent AI would not be ordered to do something else. — noAxioms

A computer cannot be given such an order! Simple as that.

I don't think you understood how I explained algorithms. — Christoffer

An algorithm is an mathematical object and has a mathematical definition, not a loose general definition that something happens. A computer computes. So I'm not rejecting the possible existence of conscious AI in the future, I am just pointing at this problem in computation, following arithmetic or logical operations in a sequence, hence using algorithms. I'm sure that we are going to have difficulties in knowing just what is AI and what is a human (the famous Turing Test), but that can be done by existing technology already.

This problem doesn't go away by saying that well, as we are conscious, hence there's those "algorithms" making us conscious. That's not the issue, the issue there's simply the difference in following orders and then us thinking of the orders and then making our decision. Modelling this just like an normal computer goes works isn't accurate. It comes basically close to the hard problem of consciousness, but this actually is about the limitations of Turing Machines that Turing in his famous article stated.

The Church-Turing Thesis asserts that any function that can be computed by an algorithm can be computed by a Turing machine. Turing himself showed that there are limitations on what a Turing machine can do, which basically is a result of negative self reference, when you think about it. In a way you could state the problem of subjectivity, which is crucial for consciousness. All that I'm saying is that computation isn't going to solve this riddle, it indeed can be something emerging from mimicking and plagiarization, but not just from simple algorithms that a computer goes through.

No, we do not have free will. The properties of our universe and the non-deterministic properties of quantum mechanics do not change the operation of our consciousness. Even random pulls of quantum randomness within our brains are not enough to affect our deterministic choices. — Christoffer

As I said, the World can be deterministic, but that doesn't mean that we don't have free will. The limits in what is computable is real logical problem. Or otherwise you would then have to believe in Laplacian determinism, if we just had all the data and knowledge about the World. Yet Laplacian determinism's error isn't that don't have all the data, it's simply that we are part of the universe and cannot look at it from outside objectively, when our actions influence the outcome.

Barry Mazur has a really neat paper on this question, and at least parts of it are quite accessible. He ends up advocating (maybe just "showing the benefits of" is a better term) of an approach grounded in category theory. — Count Timothy von Icarus

This is a very interesting paper on the subject. Thank you, @Count Timothy von Icarus! :grin: :up:

Too bad that the basics of category theory aren't taught in school. But then again, the educational system doesn't care much about the philosophy of mathematics or the foundations of mathematics.

It's important, but not needed for creating a superintelligence. We might only need to put the initial state in place and run the operation, observing the superintelligence evolve through the system without us understanding exactly why it happens or how it happens. — Christoffer

Just like with alchemy, people could forge metals well and make tools, weapons and armour, but we aren't reading those antique or medieval scriptures from alchemy to get any actually insights today. Yes, you can have the attitude of an engineer who is totally satisfied if the contraption made simply works. It works, so who cares how it works.

Well, this is an site for philosophy, so people aren't satisfied if you just throw various things together and have no idea just why it works. You can be as far away as the alchemists were with the idea of transforming "base metals" into "noble metals", like gold. Well, today we can produce gold in a particle accelerator, our best way today to mimic a supernova nucleosynthesis, which actually forms the element. Just how off ideas of alchemy were from this is quite telling. Still, they could Damascus steel.

As per other arguments I've made in philosophies of consciousness, I'm leaning towards emergence theories the most. That advanced features and events are consequences of chaotic processes forming emergent complexities. Why they happen is yet fully understood, but we see these behaviors everywhere in nature and physics. — Christoffer

What other way could consciousness become to exist than from emergence? I think our logical system here is one problem as we start from a definition and duality of "being conscious" and "unconscious". There's no reasoning just why something as consciousness could or should be defined in a simple on/off way. Then also materialism still has a stranglehold in the way we think about existence, hence it's very difficult for us to model consciousness. If we just think of the World as particles in movement, not easy to go from that to a scientific theory and an accurate model of consciousness.

I'm leaning towards the latter since the mathematical principles in physics, constants like the cosmological constant and things like the golden ratio seem to provide a certain tipping point for emergent behaviors to occur. — Christoffer

I think our (present) view of mathematics is the real problem: we focus on the computable. Yet not everything in mathematics is computable. This limited view is in my view best seen that we start as the basis for everything from the natural numbers, a number system. Thus immediately we have the problem with infinity (and the infinitely small). Hence we take infinity as an axiom and declare Cauchy sequences as the solution to our philosophical problems. Math is likely far more than this.

Everything is nature. Everything operates under physical laws. — Christoffer

But the machines we've built haven't emerged as living organisms have, even if they are made from materials from nature. A notable difference.

If we were able to mechanically replicate the exact operation of every physical part of our brain, mind and chemistry, did we create a machine or is it indistinguishable from the real organic thing? — Christoffer

A big if. That if can be still an "if" like for the alchemists with their attempts to make gold, which comes down basically to mimicking that supernova nucleosynthesis (that would be less costly than conventional mining or the mining bottom of the sea or asteroids etc).

The algorithms need to form the basics of operation, not the direction of movement. — Christoffer

Exactly. It cannot do anything outside the basics of operation, as you put it. That's the problem. An entity understanding and conscious of it's operating rules, can do something else. A Turing Machine (a computer, that is) following algorithms cannot do this.

A balanced person, in that physical regard, will operate within the boundaries of these "algorithms" of programming we all have. — Christoffer

You're not using here the term "algorithm" incorrectly or at least differently than me here.
Algorithm is a is a finite sequence of mathematically rigorous instructions, typically used to solve a class of specific problems or to perform a computation. We might be built by the instructions in our DNA, but don't use our DNA to to think or to put it another way, there's far more to us having this discussion than just the code in our DNA. As we are conscious, we can reason just why we have made the choices that we've made. That's the issue here.

We are still able to operate with an illusion of free will within these boundaries. — Christoffer

We do have free will. Laplacian determinism is logically false. We are part of the universe the hence idea of Laplacian determinism is wrong even if the universe is deterministic and Einstein's model of a block universe is correct.

So now Israel hit Iran by going after it's air defense. But not the nuclear sites and, of course, not yet the oil installations, which would bounce oil prices higher. Seems like Bibi listened to the US administration and now waits just how the US elections are going to go.

If Trump get's into office, will then the nuclear sites be targeted?

Could there be other factors involved in perception apart from the the object of perception, sensory organs, memories and experiences? — Corvus

How would we perceive them?

But we invent things all the time that utilize properties of physics that we're not yet fully able to explain. — Christoffer

Oh yes, many times scientists stumble into something new. And obviously we can use trial and error to get things to work and many times we can be still be confused just why it works. Yet this surely this isn't the standard way of approach, and especially not the way we explain to ourselves how things work. This explanation matters.

To say that we can only create something that is on par with the limits of our knowledge and thinking is not true. — Christoffer

Yet understanding why something works is crucial. And many times even our understanding can be false, something which modern science humbly and smartly accepts by only talking of scientific theories, not scientific laws. We being wrong about major underlying issues doesn't naturally prevent us innovative use of something.

Just look how long people believed fire being one of the basic elements, not a chemical reaction, combustion. How long have we've been able to create fire before modern chemistry? A long time. In fact, our understanding has changed so much that we've even made the separation between our modern knowledge, chemistry, from the preceding endeavor, alchemy.

Now when we have difficulties in explaining something, disagreements just what the crucial terms mean, we obviously have still more to understand that we know. When things like intelligence, consciousness or even learning are so difficult, it's obvious that there's a lot more to discover. Yet to tell just why a combustion engine works is easy and we'll not get entangled into philosophical debates. Not as easily, at least.

So, in essence, it might be that we are not at all that different from how these AI models operate. — Christoffer

In a similar way we could describe us human being mechanical machines as Anthropic mechanism defines us. That too works in many cases, actually. But we can see the obvious differences with us and mechanical machines. We even separate the digital machines that process data are different from mechanical machines. But it was all too natural in the 17th Century to use that insight of the present physics to describe things from the starting point of a clockwork universe.

if we're to create a truly human-like intelligence, it would need to be able to change itself on the fly and move away from pre-established algorithm-boundraries and locked training data foundations as well as getting a stream of reality-verified sensory data to ground them. — Christoffer

I agree, if I understand you correctly. That's the problem and it's basically a philosophical problem of mathematics in my view.

When you just follow algorithms, you cannot create something new which isn't linked to the algorithms that you follow. What is lacking is the innovative response: first to understand that here's my algorithms, they seem not to be working so well, so I'll try something new is in my view the problem. You cannot program a computer to "do something else", it has to have guidelines/an algorithm just how to act to when ordered to "do something else".

To reach this point, however, I believe those calculations must somehow emerge from complexity, similar to how it has emerged in our brains. — Carlo Roosen

Yes, my challenge is that currently everybody sticks to one type of architecture: a neural net surrounded by human-written code, forcing that neural net to find answers in line with our worldview. Nobody has even time to look at alternatives. Or rather, it takes a free view on the matter to see that an alternative is possible. I hope to find a few open minds here on the forum.

And yes, I admit it is a leap of faith. — Carlo Roosen

I think the major problem is that our understanding is limited to the machines that we can create and the logic that we use when creating things like neural networks etc. However we assume our computers/programs are learning and not acting anymore as "ordinary computers", in the end it's controlled by program/algorithm. Living organisms haven't evolved in the same way as our machines.

I think the real problematic hurdle that we have is philosophical. And surely this issue isn't straightforward or clear to us.

I think that one thing would be obvious in the realism of dreams. If you don't have any idea or experience of something, you likely won't have that in your dream either.

So likely when in your dream flying a light airplane of the night sea, I assume that it's likely you flew it straight and level. It's likely that didn't stall the airplane and put it into a tailspin or perform high-G turns or inverted flight.

Having flown sailplanes, done even aerobatics with them and few times been at the controls of motor airplanes, it's the motions that you experience that cannot be duplicated by the smart simulators of today, even if Microsoft Flight Simulator mimics reality very well otherwise. These motions are very mild in passenger aircraft, that nearly everyone has flown in: the acceleration at take off and the tiny effect of turbulence. Yet few have experienced how being in a tailspin feels like or how G-forces are experienced in the air. A roller coaster ride gives some feel of this, but as a roller coaster ride is done on rails, it misses just how smooth aircraft feel as they're not attached to rails.

How that then comes in your dreams is interesting, as usually we see, hear, touch and can even smell something in our dreams, but the inner ear's vestibular system isn't giving us much feedback, especially not something that we haven't experienced. Yet if you have a lot of experience of something, you likely can feel experiencing it in your dream too.

You're conflating non-equivalent theorems. — TonesInDeepFreeze

Ok, I perhaps I could have better defined the axiom of choice, but in the latter you get the point.

This brings up an interesting question: If two things are equivalent, A<->B, does that mean they represent the same math object? — jgill

That basically was my question. And I think comes to this thread's main question, because mathematics is quite connected.

Perhaps our questions define what we treat as objects. Could logical mathematics in it's entirety be an object compared to let's say something different like poetry.

Hi javi,

Yep, even the Finnish media noticed this. But we can agree that there's countries with even worse public health sectors. But it's the general malaise in Europe, the debt-lead economic system will have huge problems with low growth, demands for the health care sector increasing and government incomes decreasing.

The fact that both in Spain and Finland there will be far more less children in the future doesn't make me more hopeful that things will get better. Even with the health care of children.

I am curious about that. I think 5 were injured last time I checked. Perhaps a mistake? Fog of war? I don't know. I'd be horrified if Israel viewed the blue berets as valid targets alongside Hezbollah. — BitconnectCarlos

I think it's quite obvious that where UNIFIL has stations and observation posts is known to everybody and in the maps. Let's take for example just some of the attacks at UNIFIL troops by the IDF:

(October 10th, POLITICO) ROME — Two United Nations peacekeepers were hospitalized after an Israeli tank fired at an observation tower Thursday, according to the U.N. mission in southern Lebanon.

The U.N. peacekeeping mission UNIFIL has been operating along the “Blue Line” that separates Lebanon and Israel since the 1970s, with a mandate to restore security in the area. - The U.N. said in a statement that Israeli forces have "repeatedly hit" its positions in recent days, including two Italian bases and the mission headquarters in Naqoura, a coastal town in the southwest of Lebanon.

And then, six days later:

(Oct 16th, Al Jazeera) UN peacekeepers in southern Lebanon say Israeli forces have fired at one of their positions in the south in a “direct and apparently deliberate” attack that damaged a watchtower.

The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) said on Wednesday its peacekeepers near southern Lebanon’s Kfar Kila observed an Israeli Merkava tank “firing at their watchtower”, adding that “two cameras were destroyed, and the tower was damaged”.

You really think that a Merkava tanks, with their superb optics and fire control just "accidentally" fire on a marked and known UN watchtower? Fog of war, really? I won't buy the idea that tank crews are so disobedient and reckless that they just themselves decided to fire upon UN installations when they felt like it.

Look, Israel simply tries to intimidate UN forces simply to leave, hence there then would be nobody observing what they do. It's the obvious fact here. Even if nobody listens to what UN says, it's still there as an annoying neutral observer. Besides, there's historical examples of this. In one case in a prior war (if I remember correctly in the Golan Heights) IDF soldiers wanted UN peacekeepers that were Finns to abandon their observation post, which the Finnish blue berets refused to do. As the situation with two armed sides pointing assault rifles at each other was dangerous, the Finns laid down their weapons, but still refused to move. Hence an Israel-Finland wrestling match ensued.

Yes, the similarities don't define the object, however. Is an "object" its' representation picked at random? Or, is there a more metaphysical meaning of the one object having representations? Is there an Object Theory? Just thinking of a way this thread might proceed. — jgill

Let's try an example to clarify this idea:

What would be the mathematical object behind/described by the "well ordering theorem", which can be described as every nonempty set of positive integers contains a smallest member?

How is this object comparable to the axiom of choice? They are basically equivalent to each other. Are they still two different mathematical objects? Do they differ and if they do, how?

Thoughts?

I think the one issue in mathematics is that defining a "mathematical object" can be difficult if there are equivalencies, multiple ways of representation of the "object". There's a whole field of mathematics just looking at these similarities, category theory.

What seems not to have been discussed is the possible nuclear weapons test made by Iran.

If the earthquake in a region where a testing site is would have been a nuclear explosion, although it could have been also eathquake (as there are earthquakes in Iran). Yet if it was, the absolute silence in Israel (except the Jerusalem Post) and in the US would be totally in line with how historically the US (and the West) reactions of the past.

When North Korea made it's first nuclear experiment and the tremors were noticed in an area where there's no earthquakes usually, the reaction was to play down it was a possibly a conventional explosion or in any case a failed test. And latter nuclear tests haven't made any outcry. With silence the North Korean nuclear arsenal has been building up.

Naturally this is speculation, but if Iran did make a nuclear test, it will be now frantically building it's meager nuclear deterrent and decentralized the weapon systems. As Iran and Israel are basically at war with each other (even if both sides really don't want to look it that way), then this would be the logical time for Iran to go through with it's nuclear weapons program. Anymore the "ability to make a bomb" isn't credible deterrence for Iran. And the rockets of Hezbollah aren't either, as Netanyahu has opted to destroy Hezbollah and invade Lebanon.

So that would leave Iranians with the attempt to have some kind of nuclear balance with Israel. Naturally this means that Saudi-Arabia or UAE could also decide to have nuclear weapons, if Iran goes public with it's nuclear deterrence. Yet also if Iran has a nuclear deterrent, even small one, it can also get a more aggressive. Which actually it has by now twice attacking Israel. Which in the latter strike the attack has seemed to have gone through... even if naturally the IDF says that the attacks were inneffective.

And Hezbollah (Iran) attacking Bibi's home with a drone in Ceasarea won't likely defuse the situation...

(Times of Israel) The Prime Minister’s Office confirms that the premier’s private residence in Caesarea was targeted in a drone attack from Lebanon earlier this morning.

In a short statement, the PMO says that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his wife Sara were not home at the time of the attack and that there were no injuries in the incident.

What the Israelis don't seem to understand is that it goes both ways. How many Oct 7s have happened to the people in Gaza and now Lebanon and how many civilians have been radicalized as a result? — Mr Bee

Formation of the Hezbollah was the result of the last occupation of Lebanon. That in itself shows how obvious this is.

In an intelligent debate this would be obvious, but policy has been hijacked by ideology and propaganda, where the leaders themselves are believing their own propaganda. Bibi and his administration has morphed into a wartime cabinet. Now before Israel and the IDF made limited military strikes, but those did go hand in hand with foreign policy and basically were peace-time operations. Now once the military has been totally mobilized (and demobilized partly for the economy not to tank totally), the threshold of military actions has severely been reduced.

UNIFIL needs to leave. — BitconnectCarlos

Whether UNIFIL is successful or not isn't the question here. It's attacking UN blueberets. It's just shows how absolutely reckless Netanyahu has come.

Well, Israel banned the UN general secretary.

Since you will have the backing of the US (Biden sent just more US soldiers to protect Israel and deployed there the THAAD system), why care? You can do anything you want, so now is the time to do that anything.

Never underestimate the impact how a large terrorist attack can be put to use to rouse people to support war.

And anyway, both this thread and the Ukraine thread were put into the "lounge", because they didn't fit to the main page. Wouldn't that be telling too? :wink:

Where is your evidence for this? Have you just made up this claim because you want it to be true? I have done a lot of researching about this and the biggest problem is that they don't specify the time of day that the maximum temperature occurs. So you can't tell if the maximum temperature happened during the day or during the night. Can you prove otherwise? — Agree-to-Disagree

Ummm....have you noticed that it's colder when the sun isn't up?

Especially in the desert it's so. And when the highest temperature recorded temperatures are 54 Celsius or so, then it's quite reasonable to assume that the highest records are taken DURING DAYTIME.

But you aren't talking total rubbish. Night time temperatures have measured near 50 Celsius:

(New Scientist, 2023) Between 12am and 1am on 17 July, a weather station in Death Valley, California measured temperatures of 48.9°C (120°F). If confirmed it would be the hottest recorded temperature at that time

See Death Valley may have just had the hottest recorded midnight ever

So @unenlightened is right. But a record to be close is still a long way from Kuwait having regularly +50 Celsius nights.

(Death Valley National park, picture from National Park Service)


But if you're living up to your name, then I can understand.

I think it's quite reprehensible for IDF to attack UN peacekeepers. A Finnish officer that I know who was in Lebanon in UNIFIL just last spring commented that it was a miracle that nobody died there. Well, now UN blueberets have been killed or wounded. Well, now the

Israeli forces fired on the headquarters of the UN peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon for the second time in two days on Friday, injuring four peacekeepers.

See here

Even the US noticed this:

US President Joe Biden has said he is "absolutely, positively" urging Israel to stop firing at UN peacekeepers during its conflict with Hezbollah in Lebanon, following two incidents in 48 hours.

At least in the Finnish newspapers an security analyst told the reality how it is, because lets face it, UNIFIL has been in Lebanon since 1978 and to for a tank to fire on UN base (HQ) is no accident: Israel is trying to get the UNIFIL troops to be withdrawn so that IDF can create a new security parameter in Southern Lebanon. And although there was one before and it didn't work so well, who cares. Netanyahu is on the roll.

And on what the future holds for Gaza, here's an interesting possibility what Bibi has in mind now:



The Open air prison is divided to many open air prisons to handle the prison riot.

Thank you for the response. I don't think we have any real disagreement here and I think you got my point.

How bad has it gotten when Scientific American, of all outlets, publishes Modern Mathematics Confronts Its White, Patriarchal Past. — fishfry

Well, that article basically states what this is about: attempt to get job positions. What better way is there to accuse a field of study, mathematics, to itself be "white and patriachial", or whatever. But it works. What can the head of a mathematics department say when accused that there are too few if any women or minorities represented in the staff? Stop hiring your male buddies and follow the implemented DEI rules!

With this short interlude to social discourse, I would like to go back to the actual topic of this thread.

And yet in the quantity theory of money graphic you posted, both scarcity (money supply) and velocity determine price. I agree with the graphic. — hypericin

Good that you agree with the Fischer equation. Yet it's actually very important to understand it, because the increase in the money supply doesn't automatically mean that it's value goes down. For example when a speculative bubble bursts creating a banking crisis, the velocity of circulation tanks. Banks won't be lending anymore, but will sit on their money like Scrooge McDuck. Hence if the Central Bank prints more money or in the Nordic model, creates a "bad bank" where all the toxic garbage loans are parked, this doesn't create inflation.

This increase in supply does not sit stagnant like you suggest. It is invested in the stock market, in real estate, and other assets. — hypericin

This is a policy decision. If you just bail out the people that where carelessly creating the bubble at the first place, then the game will just continue. If you let large banks go bust or put away to jail the most reckless bankers, that sends a totally different message.

The effect of true power can be seen in the actions of the US government: in the Savings & Loans crisis many bankers went to jail and the US handled the situation as law basically requires. In the case of 2008 Financial Crisis where it was the big guys at Wall Street, nobody went to jail and all were bailed out. The only one that went to jail voluntarily gave himself up as the ponzi scheme was too much for him. Yet if Bernard Madoff had just kept a cool head, he might have totally survived 2008 and still could have died as a respected fund manager.

If you measure inflation by the cost of goods you need to survive, inflation might actually be 2.59. If you measure by your ability to buy a house, inflation is quite a bit higher. — hypericin

Well, usually inflation is measured by an average of what people consume and the price of housing ought to be taken into account. Usually it isn't and statisticians use things like hedonics to lower the inflation statistics. There is a real economic and political incentive to report inflation being far lower than it actually is.

That vision has existed before and after Roman rule. It a Jewish constant. Whether it's Hertzl or bar Kohkba (or others in between), the goal is 1) Remove foreign hegemons from the land and 2) Re-establish Jewish self-rule. — BitconnectCarlos

Right.

But in truth Judea was a vassal of the Seleucid Empire, then become a client state of the Roman Republic, then a client state of the Parthian Empire, then came back to be a client state of the Roman Republic and later Roman Empire. It had little room to wiggle when Romans were fighting each other and then was put into line once the Romans themselves got their act together. Judea was as late as 6 AD annexed to Rome and became a Roman province, so the glorified vision of Jewish eternal resistance, always removing foreign hegemons is the likely propaganda. Of course this was before the Bar Kohkba revolt. There likely is very many of the "Quislings", which a vassal / client state tells us.

Yet patriotic history is actually quite similar anywhere: the thread of history becomes what enforces and validates our current views at the present. Many things that don't tell this narrative aren't simply "important".

Remember that now from last June, even officially North Korea and Russia have a mutual defense pact:

Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un signed the treaty Wednesday, during Putin’s visit to Pyongyang.

The treaty upgrades the countries' relationship to a “comprehensive strategic partnership.” It specifies that if either side goes to war after being invaded, “the other side shall provide military and other assistance with all means in its possession without delay,” according to a treaty text published Thursday by North Korean state media.

North Korea had a similar treaty with the Soviet Union, but Russia didn't have it until this year.

Tell that the Jews who fought the Romans in the 1st and 2nd centuries in order to re-establish an independent Jewish kingdom in the land of Israel. Is that not the basic idea of Zionism? — BitconnectCarlos

Is that decolonization, really? What's the Roman colony that they wanted to decolonize? Actually those colonial efforts of Rome came later when the revolts were put down. The Jewish diaspora into Europe started during those times, so Jews have been part and parcel of Europe for a really long time.

And you simply seem not to get it. Decolonization is a historical term. And anyway, a revolt against Romans, especially when it fails, is hardly decolonization.

For example, we don't talk about the social media of Antiquity, the bourgeoisie or the middle class in ancient Mesopotamia. Was there some class of people that could be related to them? Perhaps, but it's not correct to use such terms as the class isn't what we now call "the middle class".

Yet the other way around historical similarities or links are much used. When faced a threat, people look for similar events in history and willingly link the present to ancient history to give importance to the present. A common link, a common goal shared by generations apart sounds very nice. And people don't want to hear any historian saying that things two millennia ago were actually different.

The Serbs tried to justify their violent ethno-nationalism in exactly the same way during the Balkan wars. Netanyahu is literally a Jewish Milošević. — Tzeentch

I would say Netanyahu is far more capable and better politician than Milosevic.

Yet for example the battle of Kosovo Polje, battle of Kosovo in 1389, where after ancient Serbia lost the war to the Ottoman, even if they managed to kill an Ottoman Sultan, is very important for Serbs. Just that the place where the battle was in Kosovo made Kosovo important to Milosevic. And likely the ethos that it's a similar fight now as then:

In Serbian folklore, the Kosovo Myth acquired new meanings and importance during the rise of Serbian nationalism in the 19th century as the Serbian state sought to expand, especially towards Kosovo which was still part of the Ottoman Empire. In modern discourse, the battle would come to be seen as integral to Serbian history, tradition and national identity. Vidovdan is celebrated on June 28 and is an important Serbian national and religious holiday as a memorial day for the Battle of Kosovo.

Some say the speech that Milosevic gave in the 600th anniversary at the battlefield was a starting cry for the collapse of Yugoslavia and first step on road to civil war:

Zionism has long been understood as a decolonization movement. — BitconnectCarlos

?

This is quite funny, or as Benkei puts it, false.

As Benkei said, Zionism started in the 19th Century is linked to 19th Century nationalism. Also the term "decolonization" is also a very modern term not used to depict events happening in Antiquity.

For example, we can call the expansion of Rome, of Ancient Egypt or even the actions of the Mongol Horde as "Imperialism", yet with imperialism we mean expansionist policies of far later period. For example there of course is similar thinking in ancient times as "imperialism" and what we would now call "nationalism". Yet with nationalism we mean a specific ideology and thinking that came only far later.

I don't think so. Of course in reality this loan would have been flagged instantly. — hypericin

Was in reality the one trillion, doubling of the Fed balance sheet, flagged instantly? Nope. We actually only later found out close the system had been at a total collapse. Or that corporations that didn't have any financial problems were given money, because it otherwise "would look bad".

Just imagine that the Fed announced that they were stimulating the economy by printing 100 trillion dollars. — hypericin

First of all, the Fed doesn't have to announce and it didn't announce just how much it aided the markets during the financial crisis. Then it loaned over 1 trillion dollars. I remember that time well, nowhere was it stated that the Fed lent 1 trillion dollars. And furthermore, the way it really did assist the banks and financial institutions was very generous:

Broadly stated, the Fed chose to provide a "blank cheque" for the banks, instead of providing liquidity and taking over. It did not shut down or clean up most troubled banks; and did not force out bank management or any bank officials responsible for taking bad risks, despite the fact that most of them had major roles in driving to disaster their institutions and the financial system as a whole. This lavishing of cash and gentle treatment was the opposite of the harsh terms the U.S. had demanded when the financial sectors of emerging market economies encountered crises in the 1990s.

The Fed's balance sheet was doubled during the financial crisis. That didn't create inflation as that one trillion didn't go into the economy, because the velocity of circulation was low.



Just think for a moment: in 2003 total assets of the Federal Reserve were 730 million, less than one trillion, last Wednesday 2nd of October 2024 it was 7,046 trillion and total assets have been as high as 9 trillion in 2022. We don't see anymore the most important indicator of monetary growth, M3, but even the M2 monetary base has gone from 6 trillion to 21 trillion. Now if your simple idea of the value coming from "scarcity" be right, the a tenfold increase in Fed assets and the tripling+ of the M2 monetary base would have severe inflationary effects. Well, the annual inflation rate between 2003 and 2024 has been 2,59% annually.

Behind my example is the Fisher equation, which has a lot of truth in it: MV=PT or written out is Money Supply x Velocity of circulation = Price Level x Transactions.



In the example the money supply is hugely increased (over tenfold), yet as you just bought a Ferrari and some bottles of Champagne, the velocity of circulation is basically extremely close to 0. Yet if you give that 100 trillion to every American (which get that 303 000), the effects are devastating, because not all will just park it in the bank, it's also goes to bying stuff and services. Yet, if you just give PF members here (who can be dubious foreigners, but anyway) that 303000 dollars, then the members can enjoy the fruits of dollar having still worth. And here we see just how inflation works: those who get the "new" money first, benefit. The last one's are usually the workers that respond to seeing everything going in prices up and then start demaning increases in wages. And conveniently, they are the ones then blamed for inflation.

This is actually very important to understand, because especially the crypto-fans and the goldbugs usually just give as the sales pitch for their investment how the Fed has ballooned it's balance sheet and utter destruction of hyperinflation is just around the corner. Well, that corner can be still some way off, even if the signs aren't good when the Fed is the largest owner of US government debt and the US will continue spending as it has done until a crisis erupts.

If the belief spread that they might do this, the value of the dollar would plummet to 0, due to the belief in an imminent loss of scarcity. — hypericin

Not actually...money doesn't work that way. It's not about scarcity, it's money moving in the economy and being used to buy stuff.

Assume a bank would give you the loan for mining the asteroid belt (perhaps the banker was high and thought it was just 100 million, not 100 trillion). Then it's in the books before anyone notices and later the people in the bank have this WTF-moment. Naturally some other bankers (who aren't high) don't think your collateral was OK to get the loan and let's say state a credit loss of 100 trillion (because you forgot where you put the money).

Now comes the Fed to rescue and simply bails out the bank. The loss of 100 trillion is written away and nothing has happened.Really, the dollar is just fine. (They might not publish to avoid embarrassment the data of money supply for some days you got those 100 trillion, but anyway...)

You see, the value of the dollar only goes down if that 100 trillion enters the economic system. Only then it will drive up prices and thus lowers the value of the currency. But as you have only had the time to buy a Ferrari and fifty boxes of Champagne before forgetting just where you parked the money, your actions haven't crashed the dollar. Yet if you, as the computer hack as you are, immediately donated that 100 trillion dollars to every American citizen (that's like 330 million people), who then get 303 000 dollars each, you bet there's going to be a huge inflation spike and the dollar will go down, not to zero, but down. Think about it: what would you do if you are given 303 000 dollars? Especially when you understand that everybody else has been given 303 000 dollars. Perhaps people would simply first pay their loans back, but then they would simply start to compete on what they can buy with the money.

And this in a way has already happened in real life: during the Covid pandemic the government sent helicopter money to Americans, because there were the restrictions on working. The bout of inflation was totally foreseeable, even if usual, they lied about the effects of this. Yet when the banking crisis hit and the financial sector had huge losses, the aid the Fed gave to the banks didn't create inflation. The Fed just covered the losses, no money went into the economy. The banks didn't lend so nothing happened (except perhaps mild deflation and a recession).

Hence if there's 100 trillion in some obscure derivatives market, that amount won't wreck the price of the dollar... as long as those 100 trillion stay in the obscure derivatives market! And this is why if there really would be an Uncle Scrooge McDuck, who would be the richest person (duck) in the World who would have his wealth in coins, he could be out there. As he uses the money simply to swim in it, the value of the currency is totally Ok. Sitting (or swimming) on the money doesn't create inflation, hence it isn't the amount itself that is important, because the miserly duck won't use the money to buy stuff.

. In any case, yes North America was colonized — BitconnectCarlos

Don't forget South America, Central America and the Caribbean. The Continent of America isn't just the US.

but it also underwent large-scale decolonization. — BitconnectCarlos

?

You mean Latin America and North America got Independent? Especially when population transfer (meaning settlers coming in), American Continent comes to mind as the example. And of course with Islam people converted to the religion, so the people weren't replaced, but conquered. There weren't so many Arabs actually at the time of Mohammad.

The idea of decolonizing Muslim lands (e.g. Zionism) — BitconnectCarlos

You're really serious? New interpretations for Zionism. Besides, without going to Biblical times, it was the Romans and Emperor Hadrian, that started rooting out Jews from their land (for example banned Jews from Jerusalem) and settling other people to the land, so that's a bit earlier than the Muslims. Like half a millennium earlier or so.

They are willing to buy to the degree it is scarce. As I said scarcity is a necessary but insufficient condition for value. — hypericin

Not actually.

There's no scarcity of let's say the US dollar. Only that the Central Bank won't do this. But with a few pushes on a computer, they could make tomorrow 100 trillion dollars. Just as no bank can give you a 50 year 100 trillion dollar bullet loan to mine the Asteroid belt, even if you would have this awesome business plan to do it. Likely the Central Bank or the Financial Regulator would halt the bank giving you such a loan.

Yet if they would go along with your loan plan, once you sign it, you have just created that 100 trillion.

How could that be scarcity in the meaning that we usually understand it?

The greatest & most brutal settler-colonial project in history -- Islamic rule — BitconnectCarlos

Somebody is a bit exaggerating here. :snicker:

I think the colonization of a whole large continent would still count as the greatest settler-colonial project in history.

And I'm not talking about Australia.

Just scarcity isn't a reason for demand.

If people think something is valuable and are willing to buy it, it's valuable.

What has changed though is trade union power. The Wilson era was the last one in which the unions held huge power and influence on policy of either party. Unions were a strong force for raising the living standards of the poor, but also a strong drag on innovation and modernisation. — unenlightened

This is a very good observation. Trade unions have had (and have) both positive and negative effects. Rise of Thatcher has to viewed upon the events of the 1970's and events like "Winter of Discontent". If a trade union (or group of them) gets into the situation that it can literally stop the economy, it will use this power. On the other hand, if the impact of trade unions are minimal or diminishes to being nearly non-existent, things like real wages and workers rights do suffer.

It's totally understandable that it was especially the coal miners that were striking as basically the whole sector simply closed down. Prior to WW2 the coal mines employed over 1 million people and the UK got it's energy from coal. It should be observed that the largest decrease happened in the 1960's and early 1970's, far before the political fight with Thatcher. That the coal mining industry basically went away cannot be just blamed on Thatcher.



Again, this isn't just Thatcherism or something unique to the UK. The drawdown of German and French coal production has been actually similar. In the US the turn out from coal happened only later. (And btw the following graph below puts into perspective the use of fossil fuels when coal is mentioned)

- the 'right to buy' for social housing tenants has distorted the housing market and the British middle class regard their homes as 'assets' which are supposed to keep appreciating — mcdoodle

This is one very British thing: Britons live in very old housing and the production of new housing is very little. Seems to be lot of red tape. Someone could say that one of the objectives is to keep housing prices high in order that there's no trouble to the financial sector. Influx of immigrants won't ease the situation. And the financial sector is the one thing, the last thing that UK has going for it.

Today, the UK banking sector already consists of around 450% of nominal GDP on a residency basis, up from around 100% in 1975. The UK has the largest banking sector, on a residency basis, out of the US, Japan and the 10 largest EU countries.

Hence the last thing that the UK would want to come it's way is a global financial crises (again). It wouldn't just hit the fat cat financiers in the City, it would hit those who are already hit by the current hard times.

So, what I can infer from the posts by other members and yourself is that conservatives went too far? From what I understand its not the conservatives, per se; but, the third way politicians? Does that seem accurate? — Shawn

It's the common way to seek culprits, but I try to go a bit further here than just say that politicians have made lousy decisions. The question is why the lousy decisions. And why as @unenlightened put, has the UK been in slow decline since WW2.

Even if the Conservative Party has dominated the politics of post-war UK, there has been the Attlee administration, Wilson and Callaghan administrations and the fifteen years of Blair and Brown. So the Labor party has had it's share in power here.



It's noteworthy to understand that Labor, basically representing Social Democracy in the UK and the Conservative Party representing the right aren't so far off and different in the end. Present day Social Democracy has totally accepted capitalism and only views to regulate and "curb the excesses" of capitalism. The Conservatives on the other hand have basically accepted all the objectives that the Social Democratic movement pushed for in the 19th Century. And this causes some people to look for alternatives in the extremes as the two major parties have become closer to each other (and the outcome has been disappointing). For example in Sweden the Social Democrat party has practically dominated Swedish politics throughout the 20th Century and the 21st, yet Sweden is still a capitalist country. It may have the welfare state, but it isn't socialist (as let's say Venezuela or Cuba).

Hence if you ask "if the conservatives went too far", the real question is if in the long run would it have been different with more labour governments? The UK has seen it's share of nationalizations and privatizations. The UK was the first industrialized country and was the largest industrialized country in the 19th Century. This creates the situation where modernization is a problem. When the industry and infrastructure is already there, you can lean on the existing industry and infrastructure. Perhaps for far too long.

Take for example the British Rail system, which has been nationalized and then privatized again. This is what the rail system looked like in 1900.



Then in 1963 and 1984:


This is what the British rail system in 2010 (for England and Whales), which is quite similar to present:


When you have already a huge network, then issue isn't building something totally new, it's about modernizing. And a lot of lines have been shut down, even if now more people than ever are using rail. And with modernizing there's always a catch: if it works, why modernize it? You can put forward modernization plans. That the UK doesn't have a high speed rail network (with the exception of the tunnel link to France) as Italy, Spain, France and Germany have is telling.



Would this be really different without the Conservatives? Naturally it's an alternative history question, which you cannot answer, but perhaps puts these issues beyond party politics.

An easy example of this would be terrorists. There is a certain school of thought that might say terrorism is a product of the "oppressors". The opposite side would say that terrorism is a result of culture. Some might provide a mix of the two. — schopenhauer1

I'd say terrorism is simply a method of warfare usually done by a non-state actor, sometimes just by a single individual (example of Anders Breivik comes to mind). It's intention is usually to get media coverage and is different from an insurgency. And naturally "terrorism" is used in narrative to describe any non-state actor (or even state actor) that isn't viewed as a legal combatant or doesn't apply to the laws of war. Or then simply is a term used in propaganda for describing the enemy.

Something happening because of culture has to be specifically related to that culture. Only then can we really blame the culture. Especially when the issue is something that the underlying culture promotes. If our present culture promotes individuality and thinking of oneself, consumerism and having wealth, then us not being great in collective efforts or in thinking of others could be blamed on our culture itself.

Thank you @unenlightened and @mcdoodle for your good comments.

But the rule of the Conservatives was much more disturbing: wildly inept and very mendacious. — mcdoodle

How the Conservative party went through Prime Ministers was astounding. The inside bickering of the party was something that I've not seen a major ruling party doing ever.

We've been in a slow decline since WW2 and the end of Empire. Your analysis is pretty good; Thatcherism and Blairism were both about selling off all the government assets to cover up this decline, and once the assets are gone (to the extent that the health service no longer owns the hospitals it runs) nor the education service its schools), the sums stop adding up and there is "austerity". — unenlightened

It really seems so. One is simply the lack of long term investments, which would need simply a vision of what the UK would be. But that hasn't happened. I think this commentator nicely sums up the "short terminism", which does explain a lot:



Yet I think there's more to it than just not looking further. We have to ask just why it is so. Why is there no enthusiasm for "Great Projects" in the UK? It seems that the UK government has lacked plans that would in the be grandiose and risky. The liberalism (Thatcherism) would state that it's the best thing for the government to stay away and let the private market work it's wonders. Many times it simply doesn't go like that. China, South Korea, Taiwan and the US haven't had their governments sitting on the backseat waiting for the "private sector" to do everything. Yet when the government is active, then there has to be a vision (or a threat, which mobilizes the country).

It really has to do with the loss of Empire. I think there's something absolutely fascinating in the UK of how the loss of the Empire has had this kind of deep traumatic experience where country hasn't been able make large long term investments or have grand visions... like the French. What has been great and a gift to the World is how British can laugh at this, starting from Monty Python, but also with one of my favorites of "Yes, Minister" and the follow up "Yes, Prime Minister". Jim Hacker (played by Paul Eddington) and Sir Humphrey (played by Nigel Hawthorne). Yet even this political parody clearly showed how the UK government isn't thinking of grand new designs and huge infrastructure projects. It's just about handling the next crisis that comes in from the door. Yet with it's huge financial sector, the UK could easily done what Germany and France did. Let's just remember that after the war, those two countries were in a far more devastated situation.

This lack of the British government being capable of long term thinking can be seen from many examples. First example (that comes to my mind) is just how differently the UK and Norway approached the North Sea Oil when it was found. The UK basically used the money, the Norwegians put even a philosopher to think about it and made the decision to put the revenues in a Sovereign Wealth Fund and use only the interest of the Fund. Hence all the money is still there with Norway and with this policy, the small country avoided the Dutch Disease, which actually Venezuela is the perfect example. Now Norway produces far more oil and gas than the UK.


But there are other examples.

First, there's the strange example of the British space program: the British rocket Black Arrow and the satellite Prospero. The UK government saw as the program as too costly and simply didn't think that launching satellites wouldn't be what it in reality came to be: a very lucrative market. So as the space program was cancelled. The program had a rocket and a satellite ready didn't know what to do, so they launched the satellite in 1971 from Woomerang, Australia. The Black Arrow rocket functioned perfectly as did the satellite, which then was operational until 1973, after which it was contacted annually for over 25 years.

(The launch of the Black Arrow rocket in October 1971, notice that the British rocket's technology is different from American and Russian rockets as it doesn't create the plumes of smoke as they do, hence the technology was actually really British.)


To cancel a totally working space program, leave the field of commercial satellite launches to others and then to use foreign missiles (Trident missiles were made by American Lockheed) show this utter lack of vision. You can really see the effect of the well known mantra that was told in the late 20th Century: "Only the Superpowers can afford a space program". France didn't go this way, it stick with it's space program which totally functioning today. It's submarine launched nuclear weapons are French made, and overall France has a smaller defense budget than the UK, yet has larger armed forces. And btw the US Trident missiles have had problems in test firings. What is left of a British space program, well, there was the Beagle 2 that did manage to get to Mars, but couldn't then contact Earth. The small space probe is a fitting example where the UK is. There would be obviously the talent, but there isn't much investment.




Space programs still even today demand high tech and investment, that a functioning program tells a lot of the economy of the country.

Here's a personal anecdote that may be telling: My PhD class had several women. One dropped out for health reasons, and another was the top student, by far. Shortly after graduation she married a forest ranger and became a housewife.

In the international research clique I joined there were several women, but more men than women. A fairly close colleague, a European woman who had left behind a role as housewife, became the holder of an endowed chair at a major Scandinavian university. — jgill

We can all believe this. And since people are mathematicians, they can understand the effect when the dean or the higher ups in the universtity or research establishment simply demand that "there should be more women". The obvious reason is simply viewed as toxic. That women have babies and do still become housewives. My wife wrote and finished her PhD when she was nurturing our first baby. When we had second child, she decided to stay home. My income made it possible.

Of course the present culture is in no way as hostile as was the Catholic Church before (to science in general) or the Islamic religion after the brief spell when the Muslim World upheld Western knowledge. Hence if someone cries after the "decolonization of Mathematics", it actually isn't a threat in any way to the study of mathematics.

I said math is what mathematicians do. I stand by the remark. I reiterate my literal shock that this anodyne and obvious statement generated pushback from two people. — fishfry

Confused really why you would be in "literal shock" and why talk of having pushback.

The statement "Math is what mathematicians do" can be interpreted totally differently by for example social sciences. Totally differently what you mean. I do understand your point, but what I'm trying to say here that all do not share your perspective and they will use a totally different discourse. The conclusion and the counterargument isn't that "If then all mathematicians sleep, is sleeping then mathematics?", no, it's not so easy. It's that if mathematics is just what mathematicians do, then we just can just focus on the mathematicians as group and in their social behavior and interactions and workings as a group. Because what mathematicians do is what is mathematics, we can take out any consideration of things like mathematics itself or the philosophy of math. What the schools of math disagree on isn't important. I'll repeat it: all you need is to look at mathematicians as a group of people and the behavior and interactions. And in the end some can then talk about "decolonization of mathematics", because the study will notice that it's all about "dead white European males". This is just the way some people think.

Hopefully you get my point.

But "mathematics" can be interpreted as the use of data for political purposes. Mathematics is highly political. The NSA employs more number theorists than academia does. — fishfry

Good that you used the word "interpreted". It's crucial here.

Cryptography and secure communications are important, and it's quite math related. And Wall Street uses quants, quantitative analysts, who do also know their math. Would then mathematics be capitalist? Of course not. I myself disagree with these kinds of interpretations.

I used to think so. I probably still do. Still ... Newton and Kant's absolute space and time are reflections of the European paradigm of society in their day. Some philosophers have so argued.. I'm not prepared to go into that too deeply. — fishfry

You don't have to, it's all quite simple. Thomas Kuhn came up with the term "scientific paradigm" and note that Kuhn isn't any revolutionary and he doestn't at all question science itself. He's basically a historian of science. It's simply a well thought and researched book that states that basically everybody everybody is a child of their own time, even scientists too. And so is the scientific community, it has these overall beliefs until some important discoveries change the underlying views of the community. And that's basically it.

For the philosophy of mathematics or the to the question of just what math is, Kuhnian paradigms don't give any answer and actually aren't important. What is important is the questions in mathematics... that perhaps in the end can get a response like a Kuhnian paradigm shift. So hopefully you still think that way, not only probably.

I am wondering who these people are that you and ssu think I'm giving comfort to.

Do you mean cultural relativists, postmodernists, etc.? People who think that objectivity and merit are tools of the cis white patriarchy?

If so, I oppose these people. But they're not waiting for the likes of me to give them encouragement. — fishfry

But they do have an effect. Well, It's not like the Catholic Church going against Galileo Galilei and others (or what happened to scientific studies in Islamic societies, that had no renaissance), but distantly it resembles it.

I'm big on scientific objectivity. — fishfry

But I'm opposed to scientism, and the use of the NAME of science to enforce political, anti-scientific orthodoxy. — fishfry

Good luck finding anyone here that doesn't share your views.

But some things are political, just like the response to the COVID pandemic. Lock downs would be the obvious political move: the government has to do something and show it's doing something, that it cares about citizens dying. Taking the stance that Sweden did would take a lot of courage, but there the chief scientific authority was against lock downs, so it was easy for the politicians to do so. How you respond to natural disasters or pandemics is a political decision.

One thing is to keep politics out of things like mathematics. Sounds totally obvious, but we live in strange times...

And now you react strongly. I wish you'd tell me what you mean. — fishfry

I didn't mean to react strongly. And do note that I said I opposed the kind of thinking. I tried to give the example that in many social sciences (and humanities), the people talking about mathematics (or sciences in general) use simply their own fields discourse and focus, yet then make conclusions of mathematics itself based on these findings. And that's what I referred to giving the left leg to them when saying "mathematics is simply what mathematicians do". That's true of course, math is made by mathematicians, but how that is understood can be quite different.

I should clarify what I mean by this.

The teaching of mathematics in the school system is an educational question, how well the educational system works, not actually about the subject itself, mathematics. Or if as @jgill commented, women make up 25-30% of PhD students in America and 15-20% of math faculties. Thus the make up isn't at all close to the natural 50/50 divide, hence mathematics is male dominated. Yet there being more male mathematicians than female isn't a question about math itself again. It might be a question how faculties work and what kind of groups there are and who has control of the faculty, but that isn't mathematics itself. It would be hilarious to argue the male and female mathematicians would make different kinds of mathematics. There obviously isn't "feminine" or "masculine" mathematics, just as there's no difference in the study of some specific field of mathematics done today in the US, Europe or Asia. "European math" and "Asian math" fit together quite well.

Yet exactly these kinds of differences, who is doing math and where is it done, interest the social sciences. Those questions can be indeed interesting, but they aren't about mathematics itself or the philosophy of mathematics. In areas like literature, art and many fields of human activity etc. there is obviously a difference in where and who does it to the end result. Yet if mathematics is extensively studied in some part of the World or another, I would argue that the pure mathematics would be similar. Yet I know that many would disagree with this, seeing mathematics totally similar to these other endeavors.

In fact @fdrake makes the point perhaps even better than me. Hard to talk about mathematical insights if the other person just focuses that your basically just referring to white European males (that are dead). But the fact is that many people in social sciences are simply so mesmerized by the findings of their own field, that they go too far viewing everything as a social construct, a tool of the society to control people and so on. If mathematics is a social construct, then it can change as the society changes. And here we get back to the discussion of this thread: Is math different? If mathematics is a logical system that studies statements (usually about numbers, geometry and so on), that are true by necessity or by virtue of their logical form, wouldn't this mean then that mathematics is different from being just a social construct of our time?

Hopefully this clarified my position.