but folks here at LW seem to disagree when I assert that mathematics lacks empirical content.
That’s a curious notion. I’m about ready to believe just about anything of the LW commenter community nowadays, though. I’ve been thoroughly disabused of several notions regarding this site’s populace over the last two monhs. <_<
That being said; it might help if I explain how I parse “real” from “exists”. To my definitions, “real” covers anything which is a proscriptive restriction on the behaviors of that which exists. “Exists” is anything that directly interacts with something else (or conceivably could / did). I categorize “numbers” in the same ‘area’ as I do ‘the laws of logic’—they are real, but do not exist. Mostly these things can be treated as “definitionally true”; we define 2 as “1+1” and we define “1″ as “a single thing”.
(Side note: this neatly resolves the Transcendental Argument for God, by the way. “Resolves” in the sense I am an atheist.)
That’s a curious notion. I’m about ready to believe just about anything of the LW commenter community nowadays, though. I’ve been thoroughly disabused of several notions regarding this site’s populace over the last two monhs. <_<
That being said; it might help if I explain how I parse “real” from “exists”. To my definitions, “real” covers anything which is a proscriptive restriction on the behaviors of that which exists. “Exists” is anything that directly interacts with something else (or conceivably could / did). I categorize “numbers” in the same ‘area’ as I do ‘the laws of logic’—they are real, but do not exist. Mostly these things can be treated as “definitionally true”; we define 2 as “1+1” and we define “1″ as “a single thing”.
(Side note: this neatly resolves the Transcendental Argument for God, by the way. “Resolves” in the sense I am an atheist.)