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Comment by doone on May 3, 2012 at 4:24pm

Absurdity Graphed

May. 3, 2012

Comment by doone on April 26, 2012 at 4:38pm

Some Quick Math

Apr. 26, 2012

Comment by doone on April 26, 2012 at 4:37pm

Math 331: Oh, the Utopia

Apr. 26, 2012

Comment by doone on April 22, 2012 at 12:15pm

Ooh Baby…

Apr. 22, 2012

Comment by doone on April 10, 2012 at 9:39am

Browse more Lifestyle infographics.

Comment by Michel on April 1, 2012 at 2:13pm

Comment by doone on March 30, 2012 at 9:08pm

A RESPONSE TO JUSTIN CLARKE-DOANE’S “MORALITY AND MATHEMATICS: THE EVOLUTIONARY CHALLENGE”

Matthew Braddock, Andreas Mogensen, and Walter Sinnott-Armstrong over at Pea Soup:

In “Morality and Mathematics: The Evolutionary Challenge” (Ethics 2012), Justin Clarke-Doane raises fascinating and important issues about evolutionary debunking arguments. He argues that insofar as our knowledge of the evolutionary origins of morality poses a challenge for moral realism, exactly similar difficulties will arise for mathematical realism. Clarke-Doane concentrates on the claim that we were not selected to have true moral beliefs, which he interprets to mean that we would have evolved the very same moral beliefs even if the moral facts were radically different from what we take them to be. He argues that an analogous claim holds with respect to our mathematical beliefs: we would have evolved the same mathematical beliefs even if the mathematical facts were radically different from what mathematical realists take them to be. However, even if Clarke-Doane is correct in this, we suspect that his points miss two other kinds of evolutionary debunking arguments, which look to pose a special problem for moral realism.

First, Clarke-Doane twice quotes this claim by Sharon Street: “to explain why human beings tend to make the normative judgments that we do, we do not need to suppose that these judgments are true” (Street, “Reply to Copp”, 208). We take Street’s point to be that one can give a complete explanation of why humans tend to make certain moral judgments rather than others without ever saying anything that implies that any moral beliefs are true. This claim is only about what needs to be said in a complete explanation. It does not assume that moral truths or facts could be different than they are now. Moreover, this claim has no parallel regarding mathematics, because arguably a complete explanation of why humans tend to make certain mathematical judgments (e.g. 1+1=2) rather than others (e.g. 1+1=0) would need to say or imply that 1+1=2 and 1+1≠0. Hence, an evolutionary debunking argument based on this claim by Street understood in this way is not affected by Clarke-Doane’s points.

Posted by Robin Varghese at 02:08 PM | Permalink 

Comment by Joe C on March 30, 2012 at 5:51pm

Re: the penguin. Awesome! Apparently not a math text at all, but an actual academic paper:

Meyer-Rochow VB, Gal J (2003) "Pressures produced when penguins pooh—calculations on avian defaeca..." Polar Biol (2003) 27: 56–58

That just makes me miss grad school!

Comment by Michel on March 30, 2012 at 4:45pm

So what would be the name of a base T numerical system?

Comment by doone on March 30, 2012 at 4:30pm

Potato Math Is Hard

Mar. 30, 2012

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