Re: Name the thesis: "Formal sentences capture informal ones"

From: Aatu Koskensilta (aatu.koskensilta_at_xortec.fi)
Date: 01/29/05 

Date: Sat, 29 Jan 2005 22:53:21 +0200

tchow@lsa.umich.edu wrote:

> I agree that it's far from clear how to characterize what counts as
> an adequate formalization. In fact, a large part of the point of
> articulating the thesis is to draw attention to this difficulty.

The problem with the thesis under consideration is that, unlike the
Church-Turing thesis, it doesn't equate a mathematically defined concept
with an informal one, it equates two equally informal and vague
concepts. Unless this can be remedied the level of usefullness must
remain at that of a seemingly good heuristic principle, instead of a
generally relied on thesis. Of course, I don't mean that one shouldn't
try to come up with a clear formulation of the thesis! In fact, such a
project seems to me to be very interesting, even if in the end we do not
get a clear generally accepted thesis but only a series of interesting
mathematical and conceptual results and analysis. 

-- 
Aatu Koskensilta (aatu.koskensilta@xortec.fi)
"Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, daruber muss man schweigen"
  - Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus