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Article 5825 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: holmes@opal.idbsu.edu (Randall Holmes)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: Universe is a big place ,,,
Message-ID: <1992May21.170225.25677@guinness.idbsu.edu>
Date: 21 May 92 17:02:25 GMT
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In article <9412@scott.ed.ac.uk> dlh@cogsci.ed.ac.uk (Dominik Lukes) writes:
>,,, perhaps the biggest. Say! Why do I have to understand the mathematical
>part of the Goedel's incompleteness theorem to be able to use it for
>speculations about human cognitive ability. Well, I don't want to
>solve math problems, it bores me stiff. Anyway, as far as I can judge
>all the stuff only hangs on the pressupositions from ordinary life,
>supported by our natural language, that "true and unprovable" is
>somewhat more sound than "false and provable". How can the math part
>enhance my understanding of it. Is it banned to say sentence like "the
>natural language reasoning itself exhibits incompleteness,"( as it is
>known for some two and a half millenia) without providing mathematical
>proof? It is, by all means, more esthetical, but for whats sake?
>Kick me, shoot me, but tell me why!
>
>Yours sincere & faithfull,
>Dominik.

The "mathematical part" is the entire content of the Theorem.  Without
understanding the math, you do not understand it at all.  Even the
_statement_ of the theorem requires some logical sophistication of the
reader to be understood properly.  (My own two cents: _and_ it has
nothing to do with human cognitive abilities).


>======================================|
>    My spELling iS wobbly.            |  
>It's goOd spelling bUt it wobbles     |  
>   and tHe letters get iN             | 
>      the wrOng plaCes.               |  
>,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,| .


-- 
The opinions expressed		|     --Sincerely,
above are not the "official"	|     M. Randall Holmes
opinions of any person		|     Math. Dept., Boise State Univ.
or institution.			|     holmes@opal.idbsu.edu


