Too often science attempts to address the details of a problem before seeking a broad understanding of it. In this essay we seek to correct this situation with respect to Wigner’s dilemma, by seeking to provide an understanding in broad terms of the relationship between humanity’s development of mathematics and nature’s evolution. We can only come to terms with what Wigner considered to be the unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics in providing a description of nature, by understanding in what sense nature functions in a manner that can only be interpreted as mathematical. This understanding allows us to see humanity’s development of mathematics as an important aspect of nature’s overall evolution. The essay concludes that mathematics’ applicability to physics is not a remarkable coincidence, but conformation of the important role humanity plays in nature’s evolution.
Steven Patrick Pederson