Re: Intuition about Freiling's axiom
Zdzislaw Meglicki (Zdzislaw.Meglicki@cisr.anu.edu.au)
Sun, 6 Nov 1994 12:33:49 +1100 (EST)
Although it is certainly true that much in our description of the world
and in our mathematics is incomplete and perhaps even partially
incorrect, the success of mathematics in the description of the real
world is hardly undeserved. For Nature herself engraved on our minds the
basic mathematical notions pertaining to the Universe we live in over
billions of years of natural evolution. Animals without any mathematical
training, education or culture are perfectly capable of recognising
basic geometrical notions and relations in their neighbourhood. They are
also perfectly capable of using "greater then" relation in assessing
potential danger or sources of food. They can count and recognise
equivalence classes on the basis of number of elements.
If mankind took those skills further, and pushed them hard almost to the
limits of what a biological finite mind can achieve is a quantitative
rather than a qualitative difference. The power of intuition is the
power of Nature that is a secret hidden asset in everyone of us. If all
else fails, shut your eyes and "use the Force, Luke the Skywalker!" --
use your intuition!
Lack of intuition is the main reason why it is so immensely difficult to
teach computers anything.
Best regards and greetings from Down Under,
Zdzislaw Meglicki, Zdzislaw.Meglicki@cisr.anu.edu.au,
Parallel Computing Research Facility, CISR && Plasma Theory Group, RSPhysSE
The Australian National University, Canberra, A.C.T., 0200,
Australia, fax: +61-6-249-0747, tel: +61-6-249-0158