Re: Modeling question...

From: Brian Selzer <brian_at_selzer-software.com>
Date: Wed, 19 Nov 2008 00:11:24 -0500
Message-ID: <1eNUk.670$jZ1.203_at_flpi144.ffdc.sbc.com>


"David BL" <davidbl_at_iinet.net.au> wrote in message news:11d1e40f-fb45-49bc-b14f-52a1209b5d21_at_w1g2000prk.googlegroups.com...

> On Nov 19, 11:10 am, "Brian Selzer" <br..._at_selzer-software.com> wrote:

>> "David BL" <davi..._at_iinet.net.au> wrote in message
>>
>> > The physicist Max Tegmark uses the term "baggage" to refer to the
>> > informal bindings between things in the real world and the identifiers
>> > (like "electron") that appear in all our existing models or
>> > descriptions of reality. He was using this term with reference to the
>> > question of whether it's possible for there to be a theory of
>> > everything described in a way that's completely free from baggage.
>> > He claimed the only way is to use sets of abstract identifiers that
>> > have "no baggage" because their meaning is only derived from their
>> > axiomatically defined relationships to each other. This is hand wavy
>> > stuff, but I think the distinction is relevant to DB theory.
>>
>> Can you cite a reference to that claim? In "The Mathematical Universe"
>> Tegmark hypothesizes that "Our external physical reality is a
>> mathematical
>> structure" and argues that "A /mathematical structure/ is precisely this:
>> /abstract/ entities [emphasis added] /with relations between them/." His
>> argument stresses that any words or other symbols used to denote
>> descriptions of entities and relations between entities in the external
>> reality are mere labels with no preconceived meanings whatsoever. It
>> does
>> not suggest that those labels are in any way abstract, but rather that
>> what
>> they identify are.
>
> Sorry, my description was rather lacking.
>
> Note BTW that the idea that symbols can be baggage free in the
> description of a mathematical structure is disputed by some people who
> suggest that all descriptions of mathematical structures depend on
> "metaphor" at some level.
>
> I think that philosophical debate isn't very interesting, and instead
> one should associate this somewhat ill-defined "baggage free" idea
> with the well defined concept of testing for equivalence of two given
> mathematical structures up to isomorphism.
>

It's all about interpretation. For a formula to be well formed is necessary, but not really very interesting. For that formula to be the case under an interpretation is not necessary, but is very interesting. Received on Wed Nov 19 2008 - 06:11:24 CET

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