Heaven forbid computer scientists from solving problems involving set theory. Computer scientists should never mess with sets.

I meant to tacitly suggest computer science problems, not just any problem. I am not solving a problem either. I am thinking about a problem, which would qualify for my personal augmentation to the statement; however, neither am I thinking about a problem of computer science. I am thinking about a problem of mathematics, and I am addressing it with pure mathematics.

Out of curiosity, how does someone who only just turned 18 years old come to such a "daft" conclusion?

That is a natural question. No wonder I called it daft myself. Now, I hope I do not continue with stubbornness. I am willing to redact my opinion or even completely change it. I do not have credibility to properly support it.

Only formal mathematics exists. Informal mathematics is just wrong and useless.

Is informalized mathematics wrong and useless, as it is informal and has not been formalized? If you assert so, then mathematics as a field of thought must be static: this means its development always follows a rigid and eternally consistent process, yet this process itself is unchangeable and inherent to the meaning of "mathematics." In that case, you can not let yourself to believe its incompleteness promises to consistently develop all possible solutions when targeted for practice by an interpretation. Continue by reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Completeness#Logical_completeness

Please consider studying Lee Smolin's view on mathematics. He explains a philosophy which is very much concurrent to mine. Of course, I do have my own fanatical quirks appart from him.

It looks like you have read too many philosophical books, but you have no knowledge of mathematics. Without a formal proof, any conjecture is useless and meaningless. But having constraints does not necessarily make something static. Think about music or sculpture or other form of arts. They have a lot of physical constraints and rules, are they static fields? Think about literature, you have to write in a grammatically and syntactically correct way. Is literature static? Mathematics is a very creative and vast field. There is really no rigid and eternally consistent process.

The funny thing of your statement is that most mathematicians do not care at all about logic or set theoretic problems. Those fields are not so important and logical completeness has no effect on the daily work of a mathematician. I have seen more computer scientists work on such problems than mathematicians. But really, is there any reason to separate those category so strictly?

On the other hand, there seems to be no sensible reason not to use mathematics. Or can you name even a single one to back up your statement?

The burden is on you. You even have a contender.

If do not have any reason to back up your statement, then it is false. No one here think it is true and we have already given some arguments supporting our thesis.

Clearly we aren't speaking the same language.

For example, theorem proving by monkey-based trial (starting from axioms and adding random true statements by randomly combining and transforming previous ones until the desired result or its negation is produced) is less fun and less efficient than people actually reasoning about the problem, but equally formal: the monkeys write a formal proof, identical to the one a real mathematician has to build.

Delusions of informal mathematics are similar to delusions of perpetual motion: some people really hope there can be a free lunch.

Reflexus, on 26 May 2013 - 14:25, said:
Quote
Only formal mathematics exists. Informal mathematics is just wrong and useless.

Is informalized mathematics wrong and useless, as it is informal and has not been formalized? If you assert so, then mathematics as a field of thought must be static: this means its development always follows a rigid and eternally consistent process, yet this process itself is unchangeable and inherent to the meaning of "mathematics." In that case, you can not let yourself to believe its incompleteness promises to consistently develop all possible solutions when targeted for practice by an interpretation. Continue by reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Completeness#Logical_completeness

Please consider studying Lee Smolin's view on mathematics. He explains a philosophy which is very much concurrent to mine. Of course, I do have my own fanatical quirks appart from him.

It looks like you have read too many philosophical books

"He who smelt it, dealt it...."

I don't even know what that means... So when i encounter a problem that is inherently mathematical I'm supposed to solve it in a "non formal way"? what would that be? Applying numerical solutions to everything instead of searching for a closed form solution?

“Philosophy is common sense with big words.” ~ James Madison

Edit:
One very important detail is that this exclusively applies to problems, not existing theory or solutions.

The odds of you (or anyone, really) encountering a problem that literally nobody has come across and/or solved in some way (or at least made some progress on) is remote. Usually the problems you bump into can be mostly reduced to some existing abstract problem from some branch of mathematics and you can use/adapt the algorithms of said branch to solve your real life problem.

But I'm not sure what you mean either way. Computer scientists are mathematicians. They solve problems and construct algorithms in formal mathematics, it's what they do. Some computer scientists never even write any code. Are you thinking of software engineers?

Edit history button lol

Im annoyed

I think I have not expressed my opinions very clearly in my last post. The first sentence was actually quite unfortunate. What I failed to communicate was that I think your opinions are not based on first hand experience but on your readings. I do not think you know enough mathematics and its world to have a clear view of what it is. But you already said you haven't acquired your view from books.. So.. Prove me I'm wrong by giving some more arguments and explanations to your opinion. I don't see how a computer scientist is any different from mathematicians or any other scientist. I do not understand what do you mean when you speak about "avoiding solving problems using formal mathematics". What they should then use instead? And why?

Regarding the last paragraph of my last post you have quoted: forget it. I have probably misunderstood some of your posts.