CONTROVERSY - AXIOMATISCHES MISSVERSTANDNIS

From the axiomatic point of view, mathematics appears thus as a storeh ouse of abstract forms - the mathematical structures; and so it happen s without our knowing how that certain aspects of empirical reality fi t themselves into these forms, as if through a kind of preadaptation. (Bourbaki, 1950, p. 231) So you believe that the application of mathem atics to the physical world is a miracle? If so, then I invite you to admire another miracle; I can travel around the world with my American Express card. You say of the second, 'That's just a network. If you s tep out of it by so much as an inch, your card will be valueless.' Qui te so. That is what I am saying about science, nothing more and nothin g less. (Latour, 1988, p. 221).