yego.me
💡 Stop wasting time. Read Youtube instead of watch. Download Chrome Extension

We Can’t Prove Most Theorems with Known Physics


2m read
·Nov 3, 2024

Processing might take a few minutes. Refresh later.

The overwhelming majority of theorems in mathematics are theorems that we cannot possibly prove. This is Girdle's theorem, and it also comes out of Turing's proof of what is and is not computable. These things that are not computable vastly outnumber the things that are computable, and what is computable depends entirely upon what computers we can make in this physical universe.

The computers that we can make must obey our laws of physics. If the laws of physics were different, then we'd be able to prove different sorts of mathematics. This is another part of the mathematician's misconception: they think they can get outside of the laws of physics. However, their brain is just a physical computer. Their brain must obey the laws of physics.

If they existed in a universe with different laws of physics, then they could prove different theorems. But we exist in the universe that we're in, and so we're bound by a whole bunch of things, not least of which is the finite speed of light. So there could be certain things out there in abstract space which we would be able to come to a more full understanding of if we could get outside of the restrictions of the laws of physics here.

Happily, none of those theorems that we cannot prove at the moment are inherently interesting. Some things can be inherently boring; namely, all of these theorems which we cannot possibly prove as true or false. Those theorems can't have any bearing in our physical universe. They have nothing to do with our physical universe, and this is why we say they're inherently uninteresting. There's a lot of inherently uninteresting things...

More Articles

View All
I Need Your Help!
That echo, that is a nasty echo. Anyway, um, hello! Welcome to New Money HQ. This is pretty exciting, isn’t it? Um, so as you can see, I am currently in quite an empty office space and, uh, well, this is one of the parts of, uh, the expansion of the chann…
#shorts
Here’s a day in the life of a private jet broker. I arrived at the office at 7:00 a.m. to respond to some important emails from Hong Kong and Dubai, ensuring they were received within their working hours. Being on time builds trust and keeps things runni…
Khan Academy Ed Talks with LaVerne Srinivasan
Hi everyone! Sal Khan here from Khan Academy. Welcome to the Ed Talks version of our Homeroom with Sal live stream. We have a very exciting conversation today with Laverne Srinivasan. But before we get into that conversation, I will give my standard remin…
The Best Test of General Relativity (by 2 Misplaced Satellites)
Okay… Hello. Hey. So, this is good, this is good. You - you’re working, can you see me? I can see you. Do you know what went wrong in-uh.. during the launch..? Yes - it’s not complicated, but, it’s a long chain of events. On August 21, 2014, two satellit…
Is Sargassum Attracting Sharks to Galveston? | SharkFest
NARRATOR: Bull sharks bite with more force, pound for pound, than any other species of large shark. But in Texas waters, they don’t frequently turn their teeth on humans. That is, until 2010—three attacks in less than a year. The safety and livelihood of …
Calculating confidence interval for difference of means | AP Statistics | Khan Academy
Kylie suspected that when people exercise longer, their body temperatures change. She randomly assigned people to exercise for 30 or 60 minutes, then measured their temperatures. The 18 people who exercised for 30 minutes had a mean temperature, so this i…