“The laws of nature are written in the language of mathematics” claimed Galileo, and contemporary accounts of the universe like string theory rely almost solely on maths. But critics argue it's unknown what mathematics ultimately is and whether maths is necessarily central to science and reality. Surveys show that philosophers and physicists are undecided on whether, maths, vectors, numbers or fields exist, independent of human thought. And from Darwin’s theory of evolution to thermodynamics, some of our deepest scientific frameworks rely on non-mathematical reasoning. Some theorists go further claiming that all scientific concepts can be reformulated without an appeal to maths.
Do we need to give up the idea that maths is capable of uncovering an ultimate description of reality? Should we see observation and analogy as equally important to our characterisation of the universe? Or might mathematics not only be a description of reality but the ultimate foundation of all matter? ?