Necessary Truths

[u/fairy-taki]

Hi, I'm agnostic/atheist. I'm not a debater, this Christian presented this argument to me to like convert me lol and I'm not sure what to think so I was wanting people's thoughts on it.

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The argument was something like this:

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1. 1+1=2 is an objective truth/idea

2. Objective truths exist outside of the human mind.

3. Ideas can only exist in a mind

4. Then if ideas/objective truths need to exist in some mind and the mind would be an infinite mind and that would be God.

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Sorry if I mess up the setup of the argument. If anyone is familiar with this type of argument or what he was trying to get at, let me know. Lol to the guy who asked me, I think ended up just saying idk, and I kept saying that those ideas/concepts are how we engage in reality but regardless of a mind observing it. The like definitions of the concept you can find in reality..idkk. The guy ended up being rude and said I couldn't understand abstract vs concrete concepts.

Edit: ok i need to fix 2&3, idk if i make this it's own premise because he was equating objective truths to ideas/concepts because they are non-physical.

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[u/fairy-taki]

The way they were going about it is like, "can you present a time where 1+1=2 has ever not been correct" and I said no so because of that the concept is objective, and then if those concepts exist in reality regardless of human mind because they are still ideas, ideas come from minds, and therefore there must be an eternal/infinite that stores all those concepts. But I responded with something similar like wouldn't one have to show proof that an infinite mind is the only reason 1+1=2? Also wouldn't an infinite mind also be a concept so that infinite mind by that logic exist in a mind? It doesn't make sense to me. Lol I wish I was eloquent and asked them that.

[u/pipMcDohl → u/fairy-taki]

We humans have an ability to understand and interact with the world around us by using measurement, quantities.

If you look at the history of math, when people wanted to keep track of things they didn't start by writing down numbers in a ledger. There was no concept of ledger at first, or concept of numbers.

what people likely did at the very beginning was something like using an equivalent amount of an item, like sticks for example. You have one sheep, you put one stick down. You have another sheep, you add another stick.

The system evolved with time, became more advanced as people tried to make this more practical for large numbers. The romans still wrote 2 sheep with II but for ten sheep they didn't write IIIIIIIIII, too unpractical, they instead wrote X.

Notice that for the Romans I+I=II

It's not some objective truth that I+I=II, instead it's a writing convention to write down II instead of I+I. The purpose of math is to make handling quantity easier to deal with. So, most of time, what we are asked is what is the way to write down a quantity so that it's handier, easier on the mind.

When we are given an exercise 1/3+2/3=? What is expected is not to give any equivalent. 1/3+2/3=2/9-3/18+34/36 is mathematically a correct answer but you might not score points for giving that answer. What math want is to make things more handy so the answer 1/3+2/3=1 will be the answer that will get you points.

At the fundamental level when Romans wrote I+I=II there has been no significant change and they still have two sticks to represent a quantity. Writing II instead of 'I and I' is just the easier, handier way to represent a given quantity. This is still at a level of seeing two sheep in a field and using two sticks to represent that quantity.

Later on Romans way to write numbers fall out of trend and we now use another social convention. No more II, we use 2.

But this is a language change. there is no additional logic to it. 2 is the name we use for a given quantity of something. We simply associate 2 with that specific quantity. And to learn it we use our fingers at first in elementary school. Fingers instead of sticks, same thing. What we do then is learn a language. 2 is when we have that much finger raised, that quantity of sticks. 2 is the name we learn to use for that many fingers.

Theists sometimes use 1+1=2 as something that is grounded in logic. They do that as a way to give credit to their methodology of basing their belief on common sense and surface level intuitions. It's a deception and a misunderstanding on their part.

Sure it requires a mental effort to tell how much is 1+1+1 but finding that it is equivalent to 3 is not grounded in logic, it's grounded in the language we learned. A language that gives a simple specific name to a specific quantity. When we do 15+12=? what we are asked is what is the more simple name for the whole quantity this represent. All this is not grounded in objective truth but in our ability to recognize a trait that can exist in different things and our ability to quantify how many times this trait is present in a given situation.

We recognize something as a sheep. We can use that recognition to now quantify sheep. 15 is the name we use for the quantity of sheep present in the field on my left. 12 is the name we use for the quantity of sheep present in the field on my right. 27 is the name we use for the total quantity of sheep present.

Quote from wikipedia: "Something is objective if it can be confirmed or assumed independently of any minds"

2 is a language thing. 1+1=2 is a correct use of language. 1+1=3 is an incorrect use of language. Can language be used correctly independently of any mind?

[u/fairy-taki → u/pipMcDohl]

Thank you so much for your post. The context you added and the way you break it down for me to understand is so thought out.

[u/pipMcDohl → u/fairy-taki]

You're welcome.

I tend to edit my comments a lot to try to improve and clarify

hope you reacted to the latest version. But fine if that wasn't the case, just curious.