One of my physics teachers, once said - about mathematics - "Maths is a very illogical subject. Its all theory, and doesn't make much real sense. Its only useful as a tool for solving physics etc."
And I couldn't agree more. I was good at physics and sucked at maths.
I mean seriously.
And I couldn't agree more. I was good at physics and sucked at maths.
I mean seriously.
In all of maths whenever 1 has been raised to any power, big or small, positive or negative, whole number or fraction, it has always consistently and diligently returned 1 as the answer. And yet somehow, 1 raised to power infinity is not defined. Imaginary numbers - some hyperenthusiastic maths guy probably realised, "root of negative 1 doesn't exist eh?...hmm ah well, i'll pretend it does and write a shitload of theory on it." Then coming to geometry- "2 imaginary lines may have a real point of intersection." - I mean seriously, are you kiddin me? Aren't the lines imaginary?
And then I realised that the flaw lies in our perception of logic.
Nothing really makes sense. Nothing is truly explained.
The term logic or making sense as we know it is flawed. All it really refers to is familiarity.
Our understanding of the world is nothing but observation of patterns, development of patterns on the behaviour of those patterns, and then the application of those patterns.
So when I find mechanics easy or logical, its really just that I've observed the subject around me so much, that I intuitively find the various outcomes to be in tune with the knowledge that i've already accumulated, and so, they seem to be obvious.
The whole of science is driven by essentially one basic question. The cause seeking question. In itself, this question even defines the concept of time.
Think of ANY phenomenon in the world, and keep asking the question why it happens - why different aspects of it are occuring, what is the cause of it, and every single one of them will finally boil down to a single unquestionable fact, which will essentially be just an observation. An observation of pattern - behaviour. And you will be unable to answer the question as to what is the cause of that behaviour.
Incase your mind says that its really obvious/logical, and just the conversion of that into explicable words is what you're lacking, you should explain to your mind that there is no such thing as "just obvious". Cuz if there were, we wouldn't be applauding Einstein for the theory of relativity. After all, it exists in nature. And its got so much to do with the behaviour of light- an entity we're so familiar with.
So if in essence, everything stems from a basic unexplained observation, we aren't really explaining anything at all. We're just discussing the interconnectedness or relations between the results of various unexplained phenomenons.
Magic is anything that lies beyond our comprehension.
Thus Science, truly is just the observation and application of magic.
Rationality and logic exists, only as maths.
On a personal level, I think the world is not real.
It just doesn't make sense.
Well dreams, they feel real while we're in them, right? It's only when we wake up that we realize how things are actually strange. Let me ask you a question, you never really remember the beginning of a dream do you? You always wind up right in the middle of what's going on.[Inception]
And then I realised that the flaw lies in our perception of logic.
Nothing really makes sense. Nothing is truly explained.
The term logic or making sense as we know it is flawed. All it really refers to is familiarity.
Our understanding of the world is nothing but observation of patterns, development of patterns on the behaviour of those patterns, and then the application of those patterns.
So when I find mechanics easy or logical, its really just that I've observed the subject around me so much, that I intuitively find the various outcomes to be in tune with the knowledge that i've already accumulated, and so, they seem to be obvious.
The whole of science is driven by essentially one basic question. The cause seeking question. In itself, this question even defines the concept of time.
Think of ANY phenomenon in the world, and keep asking the question why it happens - why different aspects of it are occuring, what is the cause of it, and every single one of them will finally boil down to a single unquestionable fact, which will essentially be just an observation. An observation of pattern - behaviour. And you will be unable to answer the question as to what is the cause of that behaviour.
Incase your mind says that its really obvious/logical, and just the conversion of that into explicable words is what you're lacking, you should explain to your mind that there is no such thing as "just obvious". Cuz if there were, we wouldn't be applauding Einstein for the theory of relativity. After all, it exists in nature. And its got so much to do with the behaviour of light- an entity we're so familiar with.
So if in essence, everything stems from a basic unexplained observation, we aren't really explaining anything at all. We're just discussing the interconnectedness or relations between the results of various unexplained phenomenons.
Magic is anything that lies beyond our comprehension.
Thus Science, truly is just the observation and application of magic.
Rationality and logic exists, only as maths.
On a personal level, I think the world is not real.
It just doesn't make sense.
Well dreams, they feel real while we're in them, right? It's only when we wake up that we realize how things are actually strange. Let me ask you a question, you never really remember the beginning of a dream do you? You always wind up right in the middle of what's going on.[Inception]
Noone remembers the start of life or even the earth - isn't it?
Comments
Is this from Inception?
Well, I think it's possible to remember the beginning of your dream. Like how your dream starts. But maybe it's difficult to determine how you reached in that setting!
Do I make sense? :\
and yea, I get what you mean! :)
altho kinda random post from me don't you think?
Good one, though. At least those parts that made some kind of sense to me. =P
And well, you make very valid arguments! :)
Im with you! :)
Cheers!
Always nice to read comments, esp on posts like these where I expect few. :)
Also, dude, right. I need to do philosophy instead. :P
and i don't like mechanics :-s
i kinda dont get it... :-s
and engineering mechanics :-s
my exam started on the 30th too!
co-incidentally it was math! :P
I mean do u understand why 1 to the power infinity is undefined? I doubt I ever will. :P
Pretty late, I see this, but an awesome insight you seem to have made. So many naive people may have spent wasted lives never realizing something so quintessential. :D
Also, [in case you're still interested] understanding why one to the power of infinity is not one, is pretty easy. Why you do not get it obviously, is because you are messing up concepts by using the words, one, and infinity, so loosely.
Tending to one - essential to say so, because one is a number. One specific point. Tending to one is an abstract concept of referring to some value that kind of approaches one. And tending to infinity. Infinity is not a number. And the exponential function is not defined for non-numbers, as talked of here. Tending to infinity is some abstract value that is just un-fixably large. That value, gives different values, for different behaviours of approaching one, and approaching infinity.
Did that help? Or did you not care? :)
P.S.: If we meet again, remind to talk to you about this! :D
Many years, later I guess I understand it.
Btw, where are you now?