Mathematics: The Epistemic Veil Clothing Nature by Syed Raiyan Nuri Reza

Dear Vladmir,

Thank you for your kind comment, and I am delighted you found my metaphors meaningful!

I tried to minimize commentary on the ontology of mathematics in part because a lot of scientists (wrongly in my opinion) find such discourse irrelevant to their day to day practice of science, and to what they view as scientific progress. Their argument hinges on the notion that empirical boundary demarcating the boundary of science and mathematics renders results of formal proofs and theorems of limited relevance.

I wanted to demonstrate even if a scientists chose to remain silent on the ontology of mathematics, mathematical theorems and ideas will still exert profound impact on the natural sciences simply because without mathematics we cannot say anything sophisticated and worthwhile on what we observe, measure, and experiment on.

I look forward to reading your essay, rating it, and leaving a meaningful critique!

Dear Vladimir,

In my comment I dropped an "i" in your name. I am really sorry! It was a typo.

Kind Regards,

Raiyan Reza

Dear Satyavarapu Naga Parameswara Gupta,

Thank you for finding my essay to your liking and for finding time to leave a thoughtful message!

For avoiding any misunderstanding, I want to inform you as I am a lowly undergrad as of now, therefore I am not entitled to the honorific: Prof.

Moving forward, a little clarification on our thesis (produced with my co-author, Rastin Reza). My submission does not delve on the motivation behind the development of mathematics. There are many branches of mathematics that had been developed in the post and are currently undergoing development in the present without any consideration of the physical reality.

Therefore, our essay does not claim mathematics is developed for observation of nature, which is what I understood from you comment:

"You nicely said mathematics is developed by humans for a better understanding of Nature."

However, we entertained the idea that perhaps no observation we make can ascend to the status of science without finding mathematical expression.

Accordingly, if indeed there is an error at the level of formulation of our equations, then further observation of Nature will show divergence between what we formulated and what we predicted.

I, along with my co-author, look forward to reading your essay!

Kind Regards,

Raiyan Reza

Dear Vladimir Rogozhin,

Thanks for your well wishes, and we too wish you well both in this context and with your research work!

As Hegel said "the owl of Minerva begins its flight only at dusk'. It is obvious that the dusk in the foundations of knowledge has not yet come.

Beautifully said, it is true, we do not have answers to foundational questions confronting mathematics and natural sciences, and doing so will usher a dawn to our quest for knowledge.

Best Wishes,

Raiyan Reza and Rastin Reza

Dear Luca Valeri,

Thanks for your kind feedback and good evaluation of my essay!

Entertaining the paradigm of mathematics as the exclusive language of human advanced cognition (hence language of science), the answer to mathematics' unreasonable effectiveness ( borrowing Wigner's remark) is we only can model what is mathematical, and nothing beyond it.

So any aspect of reality beyond mathematics is beyond our grasp of cognition and conceptualization.

I by no mean propose this as final answer, merely following the conclusion of the tentative and speculative ideas I ( & my co-author) presented in the essay and I suppose this is how our paradigm will address the mystery of mathematics' profound connection to reality.

I intentionally avoided discussion on the ontological status of mathematics in my essay because I wanted to show even if we chose to ignore the problem ( and it is an important problem) of what precisely is the ontic status of mathematical object, the 3 uns of undecidability, uncomputability, and Unpredictability would matter to the scientists.

Finally, I eagerly look forward to reading your work and its contribution to this interesting conversation, and will leave behind a feedback.

Kind Regards,

Raiyan Reza

Dear Dr. Alyssa Adams,

Thank you for your kind feedback!

I am in agreements. While in the essay I did not reflect on the ontological status of mathematics, merely that we cannot reason scientifically without the usage of mathematics, I believe that math while deeply linked to our psychology is at the same time independent of it.

Alien species aside, we can also readily use computers to do mathematics, and I think that is a good argument that mathematics indeed is independent of the human mind.

An interesting experiment is to ask complete novices in computer science and mathematics to code some basic arithmetic. For instance, raising a number by an exponent. Many people don't know that any number raised to zero is one, and indeed would be surprised that their correct code automatically gives the right response. If mathematics was purely psychological, then there was no way they could have given a code that produced a counter-intuitive but correct ans. Or at least this is how I would interpret this situation.

Again, thanks for your feedback here!

Best Wishes,

Raiyan Reza

Dear Professor Satyavarapu Naga Parameswara Gupta,

Thanks!

Read your feedback, and have produced a reply!

Best Wishes,

Raiyan Reza

Dear Professor Satyavarapu Naga Parameswara Gupta ,

I am sorry for missing out on this thread!

And, thanks for your remarks on my future potential. and for your good rating!

Best Wishes,

Raiyan Reza