Related papers: |{Math, Philosophy, Programming, Writing}| = 1
Symbolic calculators like Mathematica are becoming more commonplace among upper level physics students. The presence of such a powerful calculator can couple strongly to the type of mathematical reasoning students employ. It does not merely…
In the ML fairness literature, there have been few investigations through the viewpoint of philosophy, a lens that encourages the critical evaluation of basic assumptions. The purpose of this paper is to use three ideas from the philosophy…
More than a speculative technology, quantum computing seems to challenge our most basic intuitions about how the physical world should behave. In this thesis I show that, while some intuitions from classical computer science must be…
Independence -- the study of what is relevant to a given problem of reasoning -- has received an increasing attention from the AI community. In this paper, we consider two basic forms of independence, namely, a syntactic one and a semantic…
An attempt at unifying logic and functional programming is reported. As a starting point, we take the view that "logic programs" are not about logic but constitute inductive definitions of sets and relations. A skeletal language design…
This chapter does not deal with specific tools and techniques for managing complex systems, but proposes some basic concepts that help us to think and speak about complexity. We review classical thinking and its intrinsic drawbacks when…
Discrete mathematics is the foundation of computer science. It focuses on concepts and reasoning methods that are studied using math notations. It has long been argued that discrete math is better taught with programming, which takes…
Over the past few decades the notion of symmetry has played a major role in physics and in the philosophy of physics. Philosophers have used symmetry to discuss the ontology and seeming objectivity of the laws of physics. We introduce…
Why do some things succeed in the marketplace of ideas? While some argue that content drives success, others suggest that style, or the way ideas are presented, also plays an important role. To provide a stringent test of style's…
The notion of argumentation and the one of belief stand in a problematic relation to one another. On the one hand, argumentation is crucial for belief formation: as the outcome of a process of arguing, an agent might come to (justifiably)…
This article was written in response to a request from an editor of American Vedantist. It is shown that the idea that consciousness is essential to understanding quantum mechanics arises from logical fallacies. This may be welcome news to…
Physics is so successful today in understanding the nature of matter. What can it say about mind ? Is it possible to have a unified theory of matter and mind within the framework of modern science ? Is Consciousness an accident or is it a…
The purpose of this essay is to bring out the unique role of Mathematics in providing a base to the diverse sciences which conform to its rigid structure. Of these the physical and economic sciences are so intimately linked with…
What do we do when cosmology raises questions it cannot answer? These include the existence of a multiverse and the universality of the laws of physics. We cannot settle any of these issues by experiment, and this is where philosophers…
Programming is about automation in a wide variety of domains. Developing itself is one of those. As a side-effect, progress in automated coding may make people less willing to learn computer programming. This could become an issue, if the…
Recent developments in computer programming and in mathematics suggest that there is a strong case for a new way of introducing programming to enhance the learning of school mathematics. The article describes a collaboration of mathematics…
Logic can be made useful for programming and for databases independently of logic programming. To be useful in this way, logic has to provide a mechanism for the definition of new functions and new relations on the basis of those given in…
Since I first became enthralled with physics as a teenager, I've been intrigued by the philosophical aspects of the discipline. As I approached the end of my career as an experimental physicist and observational astronomer (I'm now…
As computer systems become more and more complex, software and tools lag more and more behind. This is especially true for scientific software that often demands high performance, and thus needs to take advantage of parallelisms, memory…
At the beginning, programming was inspired by the search of the best solutions. At that time some fundamental stones like famous languages and object oriented and structured programming were laid. It was found later that applications could…