Theos-Talk Archives (January 1997 Message tl00152)

>You made a definative statement about the nature of mathematical laws.
>This is a claim that has been extensively discussed in the field, and is
>widely agreed to have been fully resolved earlier in the century.

I'm sorry, but I have to differ. The subject is by no means considered 
resolved. To the extent that there is a dominant philosopher in the area, 
it would have to be the rather cranky but well-regarded Karl Popper, who 
insisted in no equivocal terms that mathematical laws pre-exist their 
discovery (while at the same time indulging in some self-contradictory 
screeds attacking a straw man version of Platonic idealism). If your 
mathematician friends are telling you that this issue was settled by 
Godel's Theorem, they are not accurately respresenting the state of 
mathematical philosophy.

I should mention, les I be accused of bias, that I consider mathematical 
laws to be psychological phenomena and not physical realities. I just 
can't go along with a statement that the world has come to share my 
position. It hasn't.

Tim Maroney