ZOMBIE FORUMS

*Points at topic header*

Because that's what this debate is about!

Not really. Why should we be teaching stuff that isn't true? I first learned about Bohrs in the context of it being an obsolete model of the atom, and learned all about how Columbus wiped out the Arawaks and didn't really discover anything. I can't really remember how Newton was handled, but if it's not true then it shouldn't be taught like it is.

"It's a bird," creationists say.

<a href="http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/diapsids/birds/archaeopteryx.html">"You're an idiot"</a> science responds.

Newtonian physics is usually qualified, because enough high school students know that it breaks down at high speeds that physics teachers get annoyed by the little smart-asses pointing it out year after year. In contrast, the circuit model of electricity is almost never qualified, despite the fact that it breaks down even worse than Newton if certain assumptions about the scale of the physical circuit and the wavelength of the current on it don't hold.

Truth doesn't enter into science and it never has. All that matters is accuracy, precision, and the assumptions that you operate under.

The point I think needs to be made is ONLY MATHEMATICIANS DEAL WITH TRUTH. Everyone else, at some point, makes an engineering approximation and applies a set of assumptions. Scientists sit the borderline between mathematics and engineering with respect to falsifiability and proof. Experiments take place in the real world and must be conducted using the best models available. Statistics are gathered and correlations are drawn. Strong correlation and/or agreement with the tested model support the model, which then may be used as an assumption in future experiments.

Statistical correlation is not causation.
Statistical correlation is not proof of anything.
Statistical correlation is a metric that computes the distance between two or more vectors.

As to what gets taught in schools, well ... The subjects are either subjective (history, literature, art), based on an arbitrary system (language, social studies) or incomplete (math, physics, biology) I didn't learn why (-1)<span style="vertical-align:super">0.5</span> = <i>i</i> in High School math, and we didn't cover the latest in quantum physics either. That doesn't make me feel betrayed and cheated ..


I'm not really too sure why evolution gets singled out by fundamentalists so much. I'd think they'd be more concerned with the second law of thermodynamics, since it contradicts rather more of the Bible than just the first page or too....

I learned that. i=sqrt(-1) because that is what it is defined as.


Not really. Firstly, when God cursed us to sicken and die, it's entirely possible that he created entropy along with that. Also, no system that has God working within it can be said to truly be closed (because God is outside of it, and presumably occasionally adding in energy with his miracles), and the second law only applies within closed systems.

"Truth" implies knowledge about something in the real world. Are you implying that numbers are real, and if so, in what way are they real? The number 2 certainly can't be said to be real in the same way that my foot can.

That wasn't the way I learned it (and how can a noun be true anyway?).

I was trying to convey that mathematicians always explicitly express their assumptions and don't apply assumptions to a domain if they are not provably applicable everywhere in that domain. (Yes, I am aware of the mathematical distinction between "everywhere", "almost everywhere", and "for some") Thus, correct mathematical proofs and solutions are always true, conditioned on the basic assumptions that define the mathematical framework. Practical engineering solutions, by contrast, are often based on working approximations or numerical solutions that cannot be proved; they are "good enough".

Here's the problem with that though: even that relies upon methods of making connections between ideas, methods that are hard-wired into our psychology on a very deep level (in fact, without them thinking is simply not possible). These ways of connecting ideas reflect nothing other than the psychology of the human mind.

I'd think that the first law would be more contradictory. Conservation of energy and matter are quite contrary to many Biblical things.


It is correct that a statement that is "true" will always require that someone somewhere knows something about the statement, but you make an incorrect corelation between "truth" and "reality." They are not interchangable. Wether an object is "true" cannot be determined because "truth" is a property of statements, not objects.

It is assumed that schools will provide information about the statement rather than just blurting out statments without some sort of connection to the students experiences. Of course you can debate that nothing can ever be 100% true as all "things that are true" are based on the assumption that other things are true. Of course for the purpose of public schools something similar to the Descartesian assumption cogito ergo sum has to be assumed to be true. If this is not true then schools have no purpose whatsoever, and this whole debate is a moot point.


Numbers are conceptual, but things can be true within the realm of a concept. Numbers are based on "this many will alway be this many."

With respect to Thinman's statement, "ONLY MATHEMATICIANS DEAL WITH TRUTH", and some intervening discussion ...



(Emphasis mine.)

From my mathematician's point of view, IcyMonkey is the one begging the question. He's denying both the universality of logic as a means for deducing theorems (note the word I use here! I say nothing of theories!) and making a blanketing, universal, unprovable statement himself. How does he know that latter statement to be correct?

Deductive Reasoning can only prove what you already know.

Inductive Reasoning can't prove anything.

The only thing that works is getting off your arse and having a look!

Philosophers also deal with truth, but nobody trusts them.