Ask a Mathematician

[Abaddon_ire]

I've been a research mathematician for the last 35 years. Any questions?

Ok I will chuck one. I have a mate who is a PhD in pure math. I understand the import of what he does. But many do not.

How do you explain it to those who are not highly educated in the sense that it all actually affects our everyday lives?

[Fireball]

I won't answer for Polymath257, but I'd like to say that my time working with spacecraft antennas is quite likely as esoteric as the majority of the world's population considers mathematics, in general, and I only used a tiny corner of what is considered mathematics, in my work.

[Nay_Sayer]

Is it true your forum password is the long-hand version of g64?

[Jehanne]

Maybe you'll regret starting this thread, but, did David Hilbert really say, "The actual infinite cannot exist in Nature...", and, if so (presumably), was his quote taken out of context?

[no one]

If you picked a number, multiplied it by 2, added 34, divided by 2, and subtracted your original number, would you be left with 17?

[polymath257]

I've been a research mathematician for the last 35 years. Any questions?

Ok I will chuck one. I have a mate who is a PhD in pure math. I understand the import of what he does. But many do not.

How do you explain it to those who are not highly educated in the sense that it all actually affects our everyday lives?

Usually poorly.

How do you describe to first graders what a whorehouse is?

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Is it true your forum password is the long-hand version of g64?

I prefer Friedman's n(3) or even TREE(3).

https://googology.fandom.com/wiki/Googology_Wiki

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Is there a mathematical explanation for why a size 12EEE shoe from one shop fits me perfectly, but a size 12EEE from another shop treats my feet the way the Inquisition treated heretics?

Boru

[Abaddon_ire]

Ok I will chuck one. I have a mate who is a PhD in pure math. I understand the import of what he does. But many do not.

How do you explain it to those who are not highly educated in the sense that it all actually affects our everyday lives?

Usually poorly.

How do you describe to first graders what a whorehouse is?

Haha. I have two sprogs of my own. It is easier now that they are all growed up. But when they were young, when asked the pointy questions, I would make up any analogy on the fly. Not necessarily good analogies, just whatever came to mind on the fly.

That said, I have lost track of how often they chucked some careful reasoning at me. I love how some random reasoning of theirs would make me go "Wait, what?".

[polymath257]

Is there a mathematical explanation for why a size 12EEE shoe from one shop fits me perfectly, but a size 12EEE from another shop treats my feet the way the Inquisition treated heretics?

Boru

Lack of standards. ALL shoes are supposed to be torture.

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Maybe you'll regret starting this thread, but, did David Hilbert really say, "The actual infinite cannot exist in Nature...", and, if so (presumably), was his quote taken out of context?

Close. he said it *isn't* found in nature. he specifically talked about elliptic geometry as a possibility (equivalent to a positive curvature for space). This now seems much less likely than it did in 1925.

https://math.dartmouth.edu/~matc/Readers...sophy.html

But this was before Godel proved his results and essentially destroyed Hilbert's program (as described in that article).

Hilbert had a goal of proving that reasoning about the infinite could be proved consistent using finite reasoning. Godel showed in a very powerful way that this isn't possible (at least not in the way Hilbert desired).

[Goosebump]

WTF is all this nonsense?

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Thought it was a Math Forum.