Smolin principle of evocation

    came into existence at the moment the rules were codified


What's compelling about the principle “came into existence at the moment the rules were codified” [1] is that it applies to both mathematics and universes — the first by homo sapiens, the second by cosmological natural selection [2].



Those who say that mathematics is created by homo sapiens are right, and those who say that mathematics is “continuous” with the physical world are right, since the devices (brains of homo sapiens) that created the mathematics are physical devices that produce only physical outputs. But this just shows that there can be physical things that can create new physical things that have never appeared in nature before. Synthetic biology is doing that, too. For mathematics, formulation in the vocabulary of HoTT — Homotopy Type Theory — is useful in showing mathematics to be a synthetic enterprise. Computers (other physical devices) are now creating new mathematics and they (future computers and robots) will do more of this creation of new mathematics in the future, and while what they create is novel, they are not entities that have a nonphysical existence outside of the physical realm.

On what constitutes mathematica truth: What is a close match to the Smolin principle of evocation is the mathematical pluralism of Joel David Hamkins [3].


[1] Smolin on mathematics
- scientiasalon.wordpress.com/2015/04/21/smolin-on-mathematics
[2] Lee Smolin: Cosmological Natural Selection
- youtube.com/watch?v=mbYLTqvo774
[3] Pluralism in mathematics: the multiverse view in set theory and the question of whether every mathematical statement has a definite truth value
- jdh.hamkins.org/pluralism-in-mathematics-the-multiverse-view-in-set-theory-and-the-question-of-whether-every-mathematical-statement-has-a-definite-truth-value-rutgers-march-2013