Note that this idea -- that the basis of the universe is math itself -- is attributed to the presocratic philosopher Pythagoras.
In the ensuing Platonic worldview, it was understood that the world began with total Oneness. In modern terms, that's treating the entropy of the universe as equal to 1; there is only one state for the entire universe to be in. Then, this increases to twoness, between the something and the nothing. As the something and the nothing interact, that interaction is the threeness; and from the three, the multitude. They then believed that this resulted in the formations of geometry which led to the elements, which they expected to consist of the simplest 3 dimensional shapes. They were pretty much spot on, except they didn't know that the spherical harmonics of atoms are even simpler than the platonic forms.
Not a bad cosmology for 2500 years ago. I think there is still a lot of profound thought to process and consider.
>In modern terms, that's treating the entropy of the universe as equal to 1; there is only one state for the entire universe to be in. Then, this increases to twoness, between the something and the nothing. As the something and the nothing interact, that interaction is the threeness; and from the three, the multitude. They then believed that this resulted in the formations of geometry which led to the elements, which they expected to consist of the simplest 3 dimensional shapes.
>They were pretty much spot on.
Is it me or is that paragraph completely devoid of meaning? Is it actually saying anything? This reads like medieval scholastic philosophy: so far up its own bottom it no longer makes any sense.
I'm curious what you find meaningless about a plausible mathematical origin story for the universe. You don't sense meaning in the idea of "Oneness" or "Twoness", I'm guessing? Oneness is clear, I hope and twoness can be understood as a contrast or gradient (which we know to be necessary for energy flows). I'd be happy to unpack further.
And by saying something, you mean predicting something? One clear prediction (from the Pythagorean Democritus) is that the geometries of atoms would determine their physical properties. Is that meaningful?
I don't know if your comment intends to dismiss all premodern scholarship, but I would guess that there is more depth and meaning than you may have personally encountered.
I'd be happy to share some references or further ideas.
In the ensuing Platonic worldview, it was understood that the world began with total Oneness. In modern terms, that's treating the entropy of the universe as equal to 1; there is only one state for the entire universe to be in. Then, this increases to twoness, between the something and the nothing. As the something and the nothing interact, that interaction is the threeness; and from the three, the multitude. They then believed that this resulted in the formations of geometry which led to the elements, which they expected to consist of the simplest 3 dimensional shapes. They were pretty much spot on, except they didn't know that the spherical harmonics of atoms are even simpler than the platonic forms.
Not a bad cosmology for 2500 years ago. I think there is still a lot of profound thought to process and consider.