5-8 Jan 2022
Seattle WA, U.S.A.
I'm very late in sending this, but there will be an AMS Special Session on "Competing Foundations for Mathematics: How do we choose?" at JMM 2022, the U.S. winter joint mathematics meetings January 5-8 in Seattle, Washington. The session is being organized by POMSIGMAA, the special interest group of the Mathematical Association of America for the philosophy of mathematics. Abstracts are now being accepted for this session, with a deadline of September 21. I had not sent out information about this meeting because they had decided the meeting would be entirely in person, nothing on Zoom or anything else, and it was unclear where we would be with respect to the coronavirus, and where the US would be in terms of international travelers, and it?s still not clear. (Hence, we didn?t include anyone from outside the US in the invitations we sent out.) But in case you are in the US and interested in participating in the session, here?s the information about the session: Description: Does the existence of many possible foundations of mathematics (some of which are mutually incompatible) pose a problem for mathematical realism/platonism? Is set theory or category theory the right foundation? For each, there are different versions. For example, for set theory, there?s Zermelo-Fraenkel (with or without the axiom of choice, with or without large cardinals, etc.), Cantor-von Neumann, Quine's NF, and others. And then there?s category theory, and topos theory. Each is importantly different from the others. But if realism about mathematics is correct, shouldn't there be just one correct foundational system? If so, which is correct? On the other hand, for physicists, a proliferation of theories does not call into question the reality of the external world. Why can mathematicians make important and meaningful contributions to their fields and yet simultaneously avoid, and indeed, often be ignorant of, mathematical foundations? How would we argue that a particular foundation is the correct choice? Or is realism wrong, and there is no one correct foundation? Should fruitfulness be the deciding mechanism? But can this lead to incorrect mathematics? In short, do specific formulations in mathematical foundations matter? This session is being organized by POMSIGMAA, the special interest group of the MAA for the philosophy of mathematics. I?m the main organizer, along with the current chair of POMSIGMAA, Jeff Buechner, and our public information officer, Kevin Iga. The site for submitting abstracts for sessions at JMM 2022 is now open. Unfortunately, they are using a new system for submitting abstracts, which requires potential speakers to have an AMS web account. You don?t have to be an AMS member to have such an account, but if you are a member, you may already have such an account. (I suggest that you set this up on a weekday, as you can then call them if there?s a problem.) Then, once you have this account, you submit your abstract via the JMM Abstract Submissions Portal. The deadline for abstract submissions is Tuesday, September 21 (11:59 pm, EDT). When you get to the portal, scroll halfway down the page to where you see ?Please select the category for the program to which you would like to submit an abstract.? Choose the second option, AMS (American Mathematical Society) because our session is an AMS Special Session: click on ?Begin a submission.? It will then bring you to a list of sessions. Scroll down to ?AMS Special Session on Competing Foundations for Mathematics: How Do We Choose?, I?. Then, at the bottom, click ?Save and Continue?. The next page you get asks you to choose a subject classification code. You have two options: either use 03, Mathematical Logic and Foundations, or 104, Wider Issues. If you choose the latter, you should then, as a secondary classification, choose 104A, ?Mathematics and Other Fields?, and then, tertiary, ?104A28, Mathematics and Philosophy.? (If you choose to use 03, you?ll then be given a list of subtopics; choose the most appropriate for your planned talk.) I think the rest of the process is fairly self-explanatory. If you?re not familiar with LaTeX, any active mathematician at your university could help you with it, but I?m guessing that most folks working in foundations have dealt with it already. POMSIGMAA?s webmaster, Kevin Iga kevin.iga@pepperdine.edu<mailto:kevin.iga@pepperdine.edu>, can probably also help you if you contact him. (I can too, but since it?s a few years since I wrote anything in LaTeX, I?m much slower at it.) Detailed instructions on submitting abstracts are provided within the system, as well as on the JMM website. All presenters will be expected to register for the meeting after they are included in the program (and, as I said, you have to be physically present to give your talk). If you have any questions related to submitting an abstract through this system please contact TECH SUPPORT AT CONFEX. For general questions related to your session or regarding the JMM please email Meetings staff whenever needed <mailto:meet@ams.org> . For the most up-to-date information on the JMM 2022 please visit the JMM website. I would appreciate it if you?d notify me when you?ve submitted your abstract, as unlike the system in previous years, it doesn?t notify me when a new abstract has been submitted, though I can go check it. Thank you. Bonnie Gold Professor Emerita Monmouth University bgold@monmouth.edu<mailto:bgold@monmouth.edu> 732-890-9976 -- [LOGIC] mailing list http://www.dvmlg.de/mailingliste.html Archive: http://www.illc.uva.nl/LogicList/ provided by a collaboration of the DVMLG, the Maths Departments in Bonn and Hamburg, and the ILLC at the Universiteit van Amsterdam