The unreasonable effectiveness. The philosophical problem of the applicability of mathematics
type: Item
instance of: scholarly article
zbMATH Open document ID: 1299.00001
DOI: 10.13130/2037-4445/1491
author: Michele Ginammi
publication date: 2014-10-31T00:00:00Z
Mathematics Subject Classification ID: 00A30
zbMATH DE Number: 6362812
zbMATH Keywords: Wigner's puzzle
zbMATH Keywords: unreasonable effectiveness
MaRDI profile type: Publication
full work available at URL: GINTUE
OpenAlex ID: W1497485579
title: The unreasonable effectiveness. The philosophical problem of the applicability of mathematics
published in: RIFAJ. Rivista Italiana di Filosofia Analitica Junior
review text: The author offers a concise introduction to the problem of the applicability of mathematics. He first notes that it has been neglected during the first half of the 20th century. Next, he presents Wigner's puzzle (and later its stronger version in [\textit{M. Steiner}, The applicability of mathematics as a philosophical problem. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press (1998; Zbl 0945.00003)]) and notices that neither realists (such as Quine and Putnam) nor anti-realists (such as Field) resolve the puzzle. He then sketches an approach to the applicability of mathematics to physics, based on relaxing the miracular nature of Wigner's miracle by taking into consideration ``the amount of work that physicist has to do in order to make a physical concept compatible with the mathematical apparatus that she is going to apply.''
reviewed by: Victor V. Pambuccian
description: scientific article; zbMATH DE number 6362812