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rate this praise to mathematics by a very prestigious philosophe
| translucent nibblets | 03/03/15 |
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Date: March 3rd, 2015 11:54 AM Author: translucent nibblets The most distinctive characteristic which differentiates mathematics from the various branches of empirical science, and which accounts for its fame as the queen of the sciences, is no doubt the peculiar certainty and necessity of its results. No proposition in even the most advanced parts of empirical science can ever attain this status; a hypothesis concerning "matters of empirical fact" can at best acquire what is loosely called a high probability or a high degree of confirmation on the basis of the relevant evidence available; but however well it may be been confirmed by careful tests, the possibility can never be precluded that it will have to be discarded later in the light of new and disconfirming evidence.
Thus, all the theories and hypotheses of empirical science share this provisional character of being established and accepted "until further notice." whereas a mathematical theorem, once proved, is established once and for all; it holds with that particular certainty which no subsequent empirical discoveries, however unexpected and extraordinary, can ever affect to the slightest extent. |