Re: Hawking's talk in Dublin GR 17 On the spot report!

From: John Vreeland (Vreejack_at_hotmail.com)
Date: 07/29/04 

Date: 28 Jul 2004 23:13:02 -0700

"Bill Hobba" <bhobba@rubbish.net.au> wrote in message news:<gahNc.18241$K53.2204@news-server.bigpond.net.au>...

[snip]
> 'the math is the real thing and that if the math works, then we understand
> what is going on. We even see this in scientists who are out and out
> Platonists, like the astronomer Allan Sandage ("I am a Platonist"), who is
> said in the August 1998 Scientific American to believe that the equations of
> fundamental physics are all that is real and that "we see only shadows on
> the wall" (p. 22). Feynman, who was probably a realist but not a true
> Platonist, probably did agree with the Gribbins and with Sandage that the
> reality is represented in the equations, which are the stuff of things, just
> as Keane Reeves sees objects consisting of the computer code of The Matrix.
[snip]

My dose of pedantry: The character you are referring to was named
"Neo" or "Mr. Anderson" and was supposedly a good programmer. Keanu
Reeves is an idiot who can act well, and supposedly can tell the
difference between reality and fiction.

--Jack V

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