What is truth?

Curt Godel, the famous mathematician, showed that in any sufficiently complex system of mathematics, there are statements that are true in the sense that they work and describe a pattern of nature that is consistent, but that cannot actually be proved mathematically using the internal logic of the axioms involved.

So, my question is, how can we know that mathematics really describes reality and that reality may simply be a construct that human beings invent on order to stay alive? In other words, more or less "subjective" representations of the way evolution has shaped our perceptions?

Parents Reply Children
  • Some people think that we live in a participatory universe, i.e. that out interaction with whatever is "out there" actually sculptures the reality we observe and if this is the case, it's no wonder the maths can't keep up as it becomes outdated every time we introduce a fresh perspective about reality which includes known physics but goes beyond it. I mean look what happened when Einstein extended Newtonian physics.