literarydiscussions.myfreeforum.org

Sitaram · Site Admin Joined: 14 Sep 2005 Posts: 1079

http://sulekha.com/chpost.asp?for...ilosophy&show=0&cid=85633

One definition of intuition is "knowledge gained of something without
the use of reasoning or the five basic senses". ...

http://www.math.ucalgary.ca/events/index.php?
newstypeid=12&newsid=695&__Goto=goto

The German philosopher Immanuel Kant believed that mathematics is
founded on pure intuition, not thought.
By the late 19th and early 20th century, mathematicians such as
Riemann, Weierstrass Cantor, Peano, Hahn and Lebesgue (to name a few)
challenged this notion with the construction of "curves" that utterly
defied intuition.

Consider the behavior of falling bodies (Newton's apple, Galileo's
tower of Pisa experiment, etc).... people have observed falling
bodies for millenia, yet neither induction nor intuition lead them to
the true nature of acceleration of gravity,... one might say that the
laws of falling bodies are counter-intuitive

Notice how freely Karl Popper uses the word "intuition" in his paper
entitled "The Problem of Induction"

http://dieoff.org/page126.htm

My notion is that intuition and induction have their place
(necessary, but not sufficient), but the underlying nature of
physical reality is not intuitively obvious, nor may it be reached
solely by inductive means

I think of the imaginative faculty of the human mind as a
kaleidoscope, constantly churning, changing (almost by chance) , (and
how interesting it is that a similar image of "the churning of the
oceans" is given in the vedas as the process by which nectar is
produced)

Such a kaleidoscopic churning may produce many mathematical models
(model theory), but then by an arduous process, we apply those random
productions of imagination to reality, until one day someone stumbles
upon a "match" between model and noumena, like archimedes in the tub,
shouts Eureka, and runs naked through the streets

For years, people called "imaginary numbers" imaginary precisely
because it was felt they had no reality or analog, but now they are
indespensable in treating such phenomena as radio waves

Yet, the products of imagination are a part of reality...

The laws of physics and chemistry do not predict rabbits, but the
existence of rabbits in no way defies the laws of physics. If you
wanted to learn to play poker, would you study probability and
statistics?

Obviously, gambling and gamblers came first, and then the
mathematicians like pascal turned their attention to it

The universe will continue after our sun supernovas in 8 billion
years, and humankind are extinct,... and this 8 billion year from now
doomsday, is something which we could be addressing, to preserve
culture and knowledge,... but no one is concerned, because it seems
so remote

There IS no causal connection, i suspect, between the laws of
reality, and the activities and products of human imagination, and
yet imagination (and the imaginary) is our source for this
kalaidescope of models which we heave at reality in a hit or miss
fashion

In a certain sense, imagination is the threshhold of Being

Wallace Steven's Essays, "The Necessary Angel," are important to the
understanding of imagination.

In Plato's Republic, the analogy about the chariot and the four
horses, the horses are imagination, the reins are intuition, and the
road is the truth of noumenal being.

But Nous, or Mind, the charioteer, is a gestalt of everything, the
horses the reins, the road,... and an illusion of sorts, i suspect

If the contest of debate and rebuttal were a productive activity,
then it would produce results; i.e. mankind would have arrived at
some unanimous agreement on key issues during the past several
millenia of dialog. yet it seems to me that there is no unanimous
agreement on anything which is nontrivial.

Perhaps it is the case that you believe in God only if and when God
believes in you.

Get your own free IRC Chat room