Laws of Mathematics and Science

guys i also have two more things i want to axe >.<
uhms ok like is this a law of science everything has some form of mathematics as in some form of number
as in physics nothing cannot exist without a number

also no action can exist without a explanation on how to perform that action

i need feedback on that

What's you question? What does using an axe have to do with it? John

Math is a man made invention to describe the world around us, accurately and concisely. Scientific Laws use math because of this. If you can not describe something with math, how will you know the other person really understands what you're saying. In its own way, it is a language. Animals don't have complex languages (although this is open to some debate), so can't describe danger or other events beyond the basics. Crows can tell other crows there is danger, and it is in the sky or the ground, but the other crows have to figure it out from there.

A sheppard might say "I have many sheep". This is a true statement, but until he can count them it is open to a lot of interpretation. To a person who has hundreds of sheep 10 doesn't seem like very many. I chose this example because some primative human cultures have a really simple numerical system, 1, 2, 3, many. They have never felt the need for more.

The big advantage of math is that it will allow you to describe things you didn't know before you started calculations. It will come up with new numbers that describe a different aspect of a problem or project. For example, you can figure out how tall something is with trigonometry, even though you can't measure from the tip of top to the ground, by measuring angles and distances on the ground. It is the same way with electronics, we can calculate whether a resistor will burn up before building anything.

yes but math is all around us everything has a area and perimiter everything has a atom so how can something exist without a form of math and if god is magic is he the only thing that can perform actions without explanations and is he the only thing that has no form mathematics in it just cause we can explain something and give it a name doesnt mean it started existing when we figured it out and made it understandable it was always there and will always be there

Since we are being philosophical...

While I agree that math is the mother science; apparently, it is not solely a human trait. Recent experiments with monkeys show that they are quicker at solving certain kinds of counting problems than American students are (I believe the experiments were done here). All in all, that result may not be too surprising.

John

and the word many is written with a type of element to produce a physical reaction with the world with the code of life so there by it has a form of mathematics and the writeing of the word or saying of the word opens mathematics and gear in the body and a genuis can explain these movements so there by it is a action that can exist but if a action does not have a explanation or it cannot be explained how can it be performed?

but u got to ask ur self how much practice did the monkeys have and did the american students do drugs?

Yep, but it is still an invention. Chimps use tools, and can learn new tools watching other chimps and humans. Like all things made by humans, it isn't perfect, but it is one of our better creations. We hope that all intelligent beings will understand what we are talking about when we transmit prime numbers, but it isn't a given. Likely, if they are recieving radio, but not a given.

The thread title has been changed to reflect what the topic is actually (if rather loosely) about.

Dave

Math is not really "all around us." Math is an abstract concept. It does not exist at all, save in our thoughts. (Regardless of whether those thoughts involve getting one's next banana or one's next drug fix.)

Math can indeed be used to describe the "stuff" all around us.



Quick question: Were the American students who came in second to monkeys the same American students who couldn't find Delaware on a map of the US? (And could the monkeys find Delaware?)

i like saying beep cause i wanna be beep kitty and have doggys >.< if u wanna know what a doggy is ask me but it may make me banned from this site. and i just got my it means i didnt try in school and got expelled but my GED!!!!!!!!! yay me >.< or not yay me i dunno but i can still be super smart and helpful to people right? and i just got into college it community college so all i needed to do was pass a small comunnity college test i forgot what it was called but i got a 102.7 on one subject so i actually beat the grade curb and stuff on it which i hope is super sexy and cute >.<

This is close to a random collection of thoughts. Let's try to focus a bit on one of your initial statements - "
also no action can exist without a explanation on how to perform that action".

What is the context in which this action takes place? Are we to imagine that a cell divides only because it knows how to do it? Or do you interpret this statement as requiring a god who has active control of the workings of the universe? Are we simply actors on a stage, or is the will free?

Delawhere?

I forget the exact citation, but if you truly want to read the summary, I will try to find it. It was either Scientific American or Science News in the past year. Basically, as I recall, the experiments used staring time as a measure of understanding of the computation. Thus, for a problem something like 2 + 2 = 4, expressed symbolically without numbers of course, the monkeys would not stare very long. If the mathematical result was wrong, they would stare longer. The monkeys were better at detecting wrong answers. I think the students were either secondary or college, but that is something I would have to check.

The main reason I read the article was my interest in techniques that measure behavior and learning separate from language. You know, can babies in the womb count? Do they respond to music differently than white noise? When you apply non-language-based techniques to animals, it seems the results are always interesting. Of course, anyone with a dog knows they are not dumb.

John

Oops, it took me too long to type this comment. It is in response to Thingmaker3's post #10.

Beep said:

and the word many is written with a type of element to produce a physical reaction with the world with the code of life so there by it has a form of mathematics and the writeing of the word or saying of the word opens mathematics and gear in the body and a genuis can explain these movements so there by it is a action that can exist but if a action does not have a explanation or it cannot be explained how can it be performed?

Click to expand...

There are some interesting thoughts lurking in this tangled mass of words. In the question at the end of this quote, you're assuming that there are explanations for all actions. An action requires an actor; explanations are how humans attempt to understand why and how the actions occur, and maybe who or what caused them to happen. Many cosmologists believe that the universe was created by what is called the Big Bang, in which an incomprehensible amount of energy appeared in an extremely small space and then exploded. The universe all around us is thought to have come from this explosion.

Granted, no one was around to witness the Big Bang, but there is some residual evidence in the form of background radiation that tends to support this theory. Assuming you believe this theory, we have an action (the Big Bang), but we have no idea who or what caused this to happen, and we have no explanation for it.

Mark44 said:

Granted, no one was around to witness the Big Bang, but there is some residual evidence in the form of background radiation that tends to support this theory. Assuming you believe this theory, we have an action (the Big Bang), but we have no idea who or what caused this to happen, and we have no explanation for it.

Click to expand...

Are we on a bang-expansion-slowdown-compression-bang cycle that never ends? Therefore there is no need for a creation, things are as they are because they always have been.

Dave

jpanhalt said:

I forget the exact citation, but if you truly want to read the summary, I will try to find it.

Click to expand...

Thank you, John! I don't wish to inconvenience you, but it sounds like a fascinating study and I would like to read through it.

I'm pretty certain it was in Scientific American, but can't recall the issue. The SA article may have summarized a university study.

Here, this will whet you appetite until I have more time tomorrow to search. In this experiment, the students were at Duke University. It is the sort of story I would expect in SciAm too, but I couldn't find it right away. It certainly gives one a better appreciation of what being 99% genetically alike means. John

http://www.reuters.com/article/oddl...e=RSS&feedName=oddlyEnoughNews&rpc=22&sp=true

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Monkeys performed about as well as college students at mental addition, U.S. researchers said on Monday in a finding that suggests nonverbal math skills are not unique to humans.

The research from Duke University follows the finding by Japanese researchers earlier this month that young chimpanzees performed better than human adults at a memory game.

Click to expand...

Wow! That is the sort of stuff I love to read. I always come up with more questions than answers from such stuff.

Well, I searched a bit more and cannot find where "staring time" and "math" were used together recently. I used a variety of other search terms, but this term "monkeys beat humans" gave the most hits. Many of the hits had to do with the Japanese studies in which the monkeys beat the humans. The Duke study found the results about the same over all; humans were a little more accurate in the task and monkeys were faster.

Here are some of the links I found particularly interesting:

Duke Study (Cantlon and Brannon)

Searchable links and full article:

http://biology.plosjournals.org/perlserv/?request=get-document&doi=10.1371/journal.pbio.0050328&ct=1

PDF version:

http://biology.plosjournals.org/archive/1545-7885/5/12/pdf/10.1371_journal.pbio.0050328-L.pdf

Earlier study that used a correction for speed:

http://seedmagazine.com/news/2006/05/monkeys_match_humans_at_instin.php

And clearly it made a splash on the Duke campus:

http://media.www.dukechronicle.com/...nkeys.Equal.Dukies.On.Math.Test-3173954.shtml



Japanese study: (includes links to watch the study)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7124156.stm

http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/science/12/03/chimp.memory.ap/index.html

A nice quote from the CNN link:

"What's going on here? Even with six months of training, three students failed to catch up to the three young chimps, Matsuzawa said in an e-mail."

As for my apparently flawed memory, it is likely I mixed up another test of cognition with the more recent math studies. I remember thinking at the time that rapid estimation of number would be a survival skill. For example, if one saw three potential predators go behind a bush and only two come out; the bush is not a safe place to go. Have you ever see a pair of hunting dogs do something similar to flush out birds? Thus, when the numbers agreed, you would not look as long at the result as when they didn't.

In any event, it is clear that mathematical skills are not solely human, nor do they require language.

Best regards, John