What is meant by the "mathematical structure of matter"

Submitted by Thomas (United States), Sep 22, 2006 at 15:14

Mr. Yenkel,

The "mathematical structure of matter" refers to the ontological conditions that make science possible and means that our mathematical concepts have a foundation in the objects we measure or that they correspond to something real in them. In other words, they express something objective. These same properties can be abstracted from the concrete objects in which we experience them and made to exist in the realm of thought, i.e. as a part of the thinking subject. Thus the subject-object separation is overcome and it becomes possible to have knowledge of the world. It also assures that our ideas are meaningful, communicable and related to the objects about which we think and speak.

"Nature's capacity to be exploited" refers not to the intrinsic knowability of matter, which it must have if there is to be science at all, but rather to the necessity of experimentation to determine the practical properties of natural objects.

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