Re: Second class posters

loiner2003 wrote:

Frederick Williams wrote as a sig:
Science is a differential equation.
Religion is a boundary condition.
--Alan Turing

Very obviously I'm not a mathematician. But as far as i understand it,
boundary conditions do refer to reality and may be necessary for the
solution of differential equations. So to this non-mathematician it
appears as if Turing is saying that religion is necessary for the
"solution" of science. Since that seems an odd thing for Frederick to be
saying, I assume my interpretation is wrong!

Can someone enlighten me, please, preferably using English! ;-)

You may recall from your school days that when you integrate something
an arbitrary constant appears, so:

integral of x squared with respect to x is
x cubed over three plus K

where K is any old constant. To solve a differential equation one must
(at least) integrate something (maybe more than once) so arbitrary
constants appear. Boundary conditions allow those constants to be given
specific values. I don't know why Turing thought there was something
religious about them but then I don't suppose his remark should be taken
very literally.

I'm reminded of my first course on differential equations: the lecturer
said that we would concentrate on linear equations because those were
the ones that governed physical phenomena. Not long before that I had
read a quotation from Einstein(*) that mathematical physics would have
to be redone because none of the equations governing physical phenomena
were linear. Something like that.

(* Gert and Epp's brother--old joke.)
--
Science is a differential equation.
Religion is a boundary condition.
--Alan Turing


.

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