<story><title>“When we do mathematics, we touch immortality.”</title><url>https://www.quantamagazine.org/20161020-science-math-education-survey/?code=3048</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>JoeAltmaier</author><text>So, the value of PI is a human invention? That&amp;#x27;s hogwash.</text></item><item><author>FabHK</author><text>There is the ontological position that mathematical truths are &amp;quot;out there&amp;quot;, independent of us, and we are merely &amp;quot;discovering&amp;quot; them. As such, they&amp;#x27;re eternal, and you could argue then that you &amp;quot;touch immortality&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;But apart from that, I find this sort of talk unhelpful. It&amp;#x27;s a bit like Schopenhauer who thought that instrumental classical music gave access to the innermost truth of the universe (I&amp;#x27;m paraphrasing from memory here) - what hogwash.&lt;p&gt;Lastly, the headline has not much to do with the article, has it?</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>GavinMcG</author><text>This is an odd reading of the parent comment, since &amp;quot;apart from that&amp;quot; indicated that mathematical truths being built in &lt;i&gt;isn&amp;#x27;t&lt;/i&gt; what the commenter disagreed with.</text></comment>
<story><title>“When we do mathematics, we touch immortality.”</title><url>https://www.quantamagazine.org/20161020-science-math-education-survey/?code=3048</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>JoeAltmaier</author><text>So, the value of PI is a human invention? That&amp;#x27;s hogwash.</text></item><item><author>FabHK</author><text>There is the ontological position that mathematical truths are &amp;quot;out there&amp;quot;, independent of us, and we are merely &amp;quot;discovering&amp;quot; them. As such, they&amp;#x27;re eternal, and you could argue then that you &amp;quot;touch immortality&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;But apart from that, I find this sort of talk unhelpful. It&amp;#x27;s a bit like Schopenhauer who thought that instrumental classical music gave access to the innermost truth of the universe (I&amp;#x27;m paraphrasing from memory here) - what hogwash.&lt;p&gt;Lastly, the headline has not much to do with the article, has it?</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>cannonpr</author><text>Don&amp;#x27;t you feel it&amp;#x27;s a bit harsh to summarise the entire debate between idealism and realism as hogwash ?</text></comment>