[extropy-chat] Role of Observer is not Relevant

[Eugen Leitl]

On Tue, Mar 27, 2007 at 04:04:15PM -0400, Rafal Smigrodzki wrote:

> ### Do prime numbers exist? I have never seen one. What would it mean

Some animals can count, but only people (as far as we know) do primes.

> to "observe" a prime number, or indeed any mathematically describable
> structure?

You can't. They don't exist, but in people's heads, and in hardware
derived from people's heads.

Neither plasma nor interstellar ice grains can count. It takes people
or computers to do that.
 
> I feel that you are invoking the razor in vain. It is not intended to
> shave the number of entities but rather the number of ideas we have
> about entities.

-- 
Eugen* Leitl <a href="http://leitl.org">leitl</a> http://leitl.org
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