Bet You Can't Define "Truth" — #33

Post #33 by Stradlater

Source Forum	MacNN
Category	Troubleshooting
Post Date	Tue, 30 Dec 2003 - 15:43
Original URL	https://web.archive.org/web/20050515015326/https://forums.macnn.com/showthread.php?t=195041

Post

Quote:

Originally posted by Turias:
Well, that question sure is.

But seriously, certain areas of math are quite ambiguous. The Banach-Tarski paradox describes how, using current mathematical practices, one can prove that it is possible to take a sphere with volume x, cut it up into a finite number of pieces, and reassemble it into two spheres, both with a volume of x.

Right... What kind of "truth" is that?

To be fair, though, when I made my comment about language being ambiguous, I wasn't really referring about the language of mathematics.

I'm not familiar with the banach-tarski paradox, strange (link please?)...but this reminds me of the simple proof in which 2=1, but the problem was that there was a divide-by-zero, I wonder if certain mathematical rules are broken in the example you mention, but perhaps not.