Chapter 4: Tensions Between Mathematics, the Sciences, and Philosophy

It is a safe guess to assume that the title of this article immediately suggests to the informed reader that he or she expects to be presented with a presentation of and/or discussion about the so-called Science Wars. This introduction will in fact briefly say a few things about this curious phenomenon, but it will not be the core theme of my presentation. Rather deliberately, I chose the term “tensions”—indeed, I did have Thomas Kuhn’s essential tension at the back of my mind, see Kuhn (1977)—and not “wars,” precisely to avoid this obvious connection. Apart from the fact that presently (August, 2008) the Wars seem to be in a phase of a (temporary?) armistice, it is my belief that the whole discussion has not been particularly productive, let alone seminal and that therefore it would be a good thing to leave it quite simply behind us.