Michio Kaku: Is God a Mathematician?

[rug]

[struggle4progress]

1. As a mathematician, I must say I find vibrations in multi-dimensional space

attractive and delightful

But when I choose a religion, I really look for something more hopeful than that: I want the poor fed and the sick healed and the slaves freed and the dead raised and the lion at peace with the lamb

[Jim__]

2. I don't believe the fact that we use mathematics to describe nature implies ...

... that nature has a mathematical design.


For instance, you could take a work of art, overlay it with a two-dimensional grid, and then create a function that maps grid points to colors and allows interpolation of color between the grid points. Would that imply that the artist was a mathematician? Would the mathematical function give us any real understanding of the art?

[center][/center]

[Igel]

4. You can describe all sorts of things with math.

Most of the times the math is truly ugly.

That a lot of physics is elegant math is partly because of the math we developed, but also because the principles involved are fairly elegant. There's a nice isomorphism there. Simple stuff = simple math, elegant stuff = elegant math. The math was ugly until we learned more; as we got closer to theories that handled all the data and only the data, the math became more and more elegant.

From there, it's a leap of faith that all true theories must have elegant math. This is just a generalization.

From there, it's a leap of fallacy that all theories with elegant math must be true. This assumes a biunique relationship for which there is no evidence.

I like the idea that all true theories must have elegant math. It makes me think that the Standard Model is wrong and there's a better description reality "out there." It provides motivation for searching, even when it looks like all the data are accommodated and nothing's left. Still, some theories have messy math and that may not ever change. Perhaps we need better math; perhaps reality's just messy.

I don't like the fallacy that all theories with elegant math must be true. It would be nifty if some of them were true. But many are still unfalsifiable, and fail my definition of being properly called "theories." Perhaps one day we can test them; that doesn't mean they shouldn't be developed.

Kaku is often just so much caca.

[rug]

5. That is indeed the question.

Would the mathematical function give us any real understanding of the art?

I answer, no.

[edhopper]

3. First,

is he talking about the thinking entity God of religion, or Einstein's God of the Universal laws.

Second, String theory is still highly speculative. It may turn out to be true, but far from settled science.

Physicist often talk about "God" and the "mind of God" without meaning anything religious or supernatural.