On the tension between physics and mathematics LSE Research Online URL for this paper: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/102962/ Version: Published Version Article: Miklós, Rédei ORCID: 0000-0001-5298-1443 (2020) On the tension between physics and mathematics. Journal for General Philosophy of Science. ISSN 0925- 4560 https://doi.org/10.1007/s10838-019-09496-0 Reuse This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) licence. This licence allows you to distribute, remix, tweak, and build upon the work, even commercially, as long as you credit the authors for the original work. More information and the full terms of the licence here: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/ [email protected] https://eprints.lse.ac.uk/ Journal for General Philosophy of Science https://doi.org/10.1007/s10838-019-09496-0 ARTICLE On the Tension Between Physics and Mathematics Miklós Rédei1 © The Author(s) 2020 Abstract Because of the complex interdependence of physics and mathematics their relation is not free of tensions. The paper looks at how the tension has been perceived and articulated by some physicists, mathematicians and mathematical physicists. Some sources of the tension are identified and it is claimed that the tension is both natural and fruitful for both physics and mathematics. An attempt is made to explain why mathematical precision is typically not welcome in physics. Keywords Mathematics and physics · Mathematical precision · Mathematical physics · Quantum theory 1 The “Supermarket Picture” of the Relation of Physics and Mathematics, and Tension of Type I According to what can be called the standard picture of the relation of physics and math- ematics, physics is a science in the modern sense because it is systematically mathematical, which means two things: (a) Physics carries out precision measurements aiming at determining values of operation- ally defined physical quantities. This is what quantitative experimental physics does, and this ensures descriptive accuracy of physics. (b) Physics sets up mathematical models of physical phenomena that make explicit the functional relationships among the measured quantities; i.e. physics formulates gen- This paper is a slightly expanded version of the plenary talk delivered at the 2019 Frühjahrstagung (München, March 17–22, 2019) of the Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft (DPG) on the invitation of the Arbeitsgruppe Philosophie der Physik of DPG. I wish to thank the representatives of the Arbeitsgruppe Philosophie der Physik, R. Dardashti, M. Kuhlman and C. Wüthrich, for the invitation. Written while staying at the Munich Center for Mathematical Philosophy, Ludwig Maximilians University, supported by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation and by the National Research, Development and Innovation Office, Hungary, K115593. * Miklós Rédei [email protected] 1 Department of Philosophy, Logic and Scientific Method, London School of Economics and Political Science, Houghton Street, London WC2A 2AE, UK Vol.:(0123456789)1 3 M. Rédei eral quantitative physical laws. This is the main activity in theoretical physics and this enables physics to be predictively successful. Both descriptive accuracy and predictive success should be understood here with a number of qualifications: the descriptive accuracy is never perfect (experimental errors); the opera- tionally defined quantities are not purely empirical (theory-ladenness of observations), nat- ural laws may also refer to entities that are not observable strictly speaking, etc. While the standard picture of the relation of mathematics and physics as characterized by (a) and (b) captures crucial properties of the role of mathematics in physics, it is some- what naive because it is (tacitly) based on what I call here the ‘supermarket picture’ of the relation of mathematics and physics: that mathematics is like a supermarket and physics is a customer. That is to say, it is tacitly assumed that when a physicist needs a mathematical concept, a mathematical structure, or any mathematical tool to formulate the mathematical model of a physical phenomenon, then (s)he just goes to the mathematics-supermarket, looks at the shelves, takes off the product needed, and, possibly after some adjustment and tinkering with it after checkout, (s)he has the mathematical tool suitable to set up the math- ematical model. But this assumption is non-trivial; so non-trivial that it frequently does not hold: math- ematical concepts are (frequently) not available in strict, precise, consistent mathematical sense and form at the time needed for physics. Moreover, creating the needed mathematical concepts might take a considerable amount of time. Since physics cannot stand still and wait until the right mathematical concepts have been worked out, physics will necessarily be mathematically sloppy, imprecise, even inconsistent during this time. One can cite several historical examples to back up this claim. In the next section four (well-known) examples are given. The tension between physics and mathematics arising from the need in physics of some mathematical concepts that are not available at a given time in mathematics I call Tension of type I. 2 Examples of Tension of Type I 2.1 The Missing Derivative in Newton’s Mechanics Newton would have needed the concept of derivative of a function to formulate the second law of motion. But this concept was not available in mathematics in precise form until the work of Cauchy and Weierstrass in the nineteenth century. So Newton did what he could: reasoning in an inconsistent manner involving infinitesimals (quantities that were assumed to have both finite and zero value) to calculate derivatives. To be more precise, Newton used both algebraic and geometric methods in his calculations. The algebraic one relied on the notion of infinitesimals; the geometric reasonings used “ultimate ratios of vanishing quantities” (Guicciardini 2002, 320). The algebraic calculations were not published until after the Principia, in which geometric reasonings dominate. Logical problems with both reasonings had been pointed out already in Newton’s time: Berkeley was to observe in the Analyst (1734) that the “limits of vanishing quan- tities” employed in the Principia are as mysterious as the infinitesimals, since the “ultimate ratio of two vanishing quantities”, when the quantities are “vanished” is 0/0, and before they have vanished the ratio is not the “ultimate”. (Guicciardini 2002, 320) 1 3 On the Tension Between Physics and Mathematics Concerning the reasoning in terms of infinitesimals, Berkeley writes in The Analyst (1734): For when it is said, let the increments vanish, i.e. let the increments be nothing, or let there be no increments, the former supposition that the increments were something, or that there were increments, is destroyed, and yet a consequence of that supposi- tion, i.e. an expression got by virtue thereof, is retained. Which, by the foregoing lemma, is a false way of reasoning. […] [The foregoing Lemma:] ‘If with a view to demonstrate any proposition, a certain point is supposed, by virtue of which certain other points are attained; and such supposed point be it self after- wards destroyed or rejected by a contrary supposition; in that case, all the other points attained thereby, and consequent thereupon, must also be destroyed and rejected, so as from thence forward to be no more supposed or applied in the demonstration.’ This is so plain as to need no proof. (Berkeley 2002, 5–6) It should be noted that, while it is standard view in history of mathematics that Newton did not have a consistent concept of limit and only since Cauchy’s work is this notion available in precise (‘epsilon-delta’) form, the standard view is contested by B. Pourciau (2001), who claims that Newton had a very clear concept of limit. It is incontestable however that the concept of derivative had not been available in the mathematics supermarket when it was needed for mechanics, and Newton was struggling with creating it. 2.2 Missing Spectral Theory of Selfadjoint Operators in Quantum Mechanics Before von Neumann Hilbert space quantum theory was established systematically in a mathematically precise form by von Neumann, and was summarized in his book (von Neumann 1932a). The book was based on three foundational papers, von Neumann (1927a; 1927b; 1927c), all pub- lished in 1927 (they were communicated by M. Born in May and in November of 1927). Of these three papers the first von Neumann (1927a) introduced the notion of abstract Hilbert space and treated the ‘eigenvalue problem’ of (possibly unbounded) selfadjoint operators having possibly a continuous part in their spectrum in a mathematically consistent man- ner, without using the Dirac delta function. The technically complete, full analysis of the spectral theorem was worked out by von Neumann in a substantial paper published in 1930 only (von Neumann 1930) (the paper was received by the journal on December 15, 1928). These mathematically precise papers had been preceded by a paper co-authored by Hilbert et al. (1928) (received by Mathematische Annalen on April 6, 1927). This latter paper is the first attempt to systematize (axiomatize) standard Hilbert space quantum mechanics, and the paper is based on Hilbert’s lecture on foundations of quantum mechanics in 1926. Although the paper was published in a mathematics journal, the authors are aware that the calculations they present there do not meet the criteria of precise mathematics: From a mathematical point of view the method of calculation is rather unsatisfactory because one is never certain whether the operations involved are really admissible. For this reason we do not detail them further. But we hope to return to these issues on another occasion. (Hilbert et al. 1928, 30, my translation1) 1 German original: “Vom mathematischen Standpunkt ist aber die dabei eingeschlagene Rechnungsweise […] ziemlich unbefriedigend, da man nie sicher ist, in welchem Umfange die dabei auftretenden Opera- tionen wirklich zulässig sind. Deshalb sehen wir zunächst von der weiteren Ausführung dieser Gedanken ab. Wir hoffen jedoch, bei anderer Gelegenheit auf diese Fragen zurückkommen zu können.” 1 3 M.