Philosophy Now Forum

pljamesone@att.net wrote:I think it's interesting when we use math it has some order to it, But when writing, it somehow, it also relates to math because of the order of math. What is that order between language and math? Paul

Well, since you ask: I think it is extremely unlikely that a universe could exist, much less support life, if it didn't behave in predictable, or at least consistent ways. So there are patterns in the behaviour of the universe and it is these patterns that we can model using mathematics. The thing about a natural language, English for instance, is that it has words for most things that we can experience, and there is usually some analogy that can be made between the behaviour being described mathematically and something we can experience. Not always, of course, because there are all sorts of mathematical things that we simply cannot have any direct experience of, such as extra dimensions or infinity. The question is, do things that exist mathematically, exist in the material world? Answer: no. Maths gets very silly sometimes, but not as silly as the people who believe it is real.