Re: A quiet query from a visitor

Han de Bruijn <Han.deBruijn@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> writes:

There are two "schools" of mathematicians prevalent here. The first one
consists of those who adhere to mainstream mathematics, essentially the
David Hilbert program.

I certainly won't have anything to do with Hilbert's program; it
provably doesn't work. That said, it's true that it is not at all
uncommon to see expressions of some vague form of formalism --
e.g. claims that we accept ZFC "provisionally" because "thousands" of
people have tried to find a contradiction without succeeding, and that
consistency is all that can be required of a formal theory, and so on
-- essentially vestiges of Hilbert's program, entirely silly and
unfounded now that the whole motivation for the program is known to be
a pipe-dream. Again, there is no need, or indeed any reason to,
associate such ideas, or any specific philosophy of mathematics, with
"mainstream mathematics".

--
Aatu Koskensilta (aatu.koskensilta@xxxxxxxxx)

"Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, daruber muss man schweigen"
- Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
.

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