David Gross - Is Mathematics Invented or Discovered?

Mathematics describes the real world of atoms and acorns, stars and stairs, with remarkable precision. So is mathematics invented by humans just like chisels and hammers and pieces of music? Or is mathematics discovered—always out there, somewhere, like mysterious islands waiting to be found? Whatever mathematics is will help define reality itself.

[MrVoayer]

Finally an answer to the question that has been troubling me for decades: will Aliens have the same Math as we do?

[williambunting]

Other species might very well perform the process “understanding” in very different ways. Perhaps frequency instead of numbers. Birds could very well be communicating science in their “songs” which are frequency of pitch and tempo etc, and as birds have such short neural pathways their data transmission rate is extreme relative to ours. Cuttlefish and octopi communicate their knowledge with all over body color, frequency and texture., so their quantitative techniques and scientific language would look nothing like ours, and could deliver very different results.

[subodhgautam]

Actually maths is not a tool for physics. Maths itself is science. Maths is thermodynamics

[vjntstar]

he said that if we made contact with an alien civilisation they would have the same mathematics than us. I am not sure I agree, I feel like it depends on how one perceives the world. If for example the aliens do not see discret objects but only flows and fluids they would probably not have the concept of counting numbers. But they would still be able to describe the regularities of the worlds with other concepts

[melgross]

I used to believe that mathematics were reality. But now, I believe that it isn’t. It’s just a description of reality.

So, for example, a field, such as a magnetic field, just is. But to calculate that field takes time, and no matter how complex the calculation, or the formula, it can never recreate that field by itself. That means, to me, that math is not reality.

[massecl]

String theory doesn't describe the physical world, supersymmetry doesn't describe the physical world, the Dirac dipole doesn't describe the physical world, mathematics doesn't describe the physical world. What describes the physical world is the results of experiment. Only the results of experiment put in mathematical form, for example through numbers, are expressed by some mathematics.

[chrisc]

Mathematics is calculated appropriation.

[glennralph]

Numbers were invented by humans just as letters were. Math can’t explain the mysteries of life and the Universe.

[glennralph]

You know this guy is delusional when he says that if we discovered life on another planet, that aliens would be using the same mathematics that we do😂😂😂. How can he say that with a straight face and expect to be taken seriously lmao!!!