A musing

But do numbers exist, in the way that a cannonball exists?

A cannonball exists in the physical realm and numbers do not.  A number by itself means nothing, it's like an adjective.  But never mind, please continue your discourse; you're in the groove.

-----

People tend to think of math as a human invention, but I think the math was already there and the humans just figured out a way to make it work for them.

We can split hairs on this one.  I think math is a human invention, a kind of mental language to help understand things that exist in nature.  Once we learned how to count and measure things we became able to understand the natural world and how things related to each other.  This is becoming a deep topic and requires more thinking on my part.  And I keep thinking of the opening sequence in the film 2001: A Space Odyssey when the apes started using the bone as a tool/weapon but that had nothing to do with math.

-----

It was good to attend last Friday's seminar after a long absence but I was wasn't able to catch up with Uncle Ken as much as I had hoped.  Halfway through a couple of old cronies of our acquaintance showed up and the conversation diverged.  Uncle Ken was speaking with one and I was stuck listening to the other, which was okay but there were some things I meant to ask Uncle Ken.

Such as, how did it work when he became a CO?  Did they assign him the job at the hospital or did he have a choice of places to go?   He mentioned that the job had to be low paying, but I wonder if that meant he never got any raises or promotions like you do in regular military service.  Maybe a vow of poverty was part of the deal (my take home pay more than tripled in the less than three years I was in).  I also wondered about housing and if it was provided, like in a barracks, or if he had to take meals in a mess hall.

Uncle Ken should provide a link so Mr. Beagles can view his latest work as shown at the Tencat.  Although he is continuing his Cats and Corn theme, there were a couple of works that I thought were simply outstanding.  Must be that new brush he's been using.