Bug#361418: Debian menu and the Apps/Science section

[Russell Shaw <rjshaw@netspace.net.au>]

Ben Burton wrote:
> Hi,
>
> > I think Mathematics is also part of Science.
>
> FWIW, I would argue that mathematics is not a science -- it does not use
> the scientific method, there is no hypothesis and experimentation -- it
> is a more self-contained discipline that, while it seeks to be useful,
> is not bound to modelling the physical world.

I think of new ways to try and simulate things faster or in a simpler
way. Then i'll write the simulation and try the ideas and measure its
performance and accuracy. This applied mathematics is very much like
a real-world engineering problem with hypothesis and experimentation.

> Certainly science _uses_ mathematics, in the same way that engineering
> uses physics, and so on.  But mathematics as a whole is somewhat broader.
>
> Anyway, I'd be very happy to see Mathematics and Science kept separate
> as they are now.  I do claim that mathematics is very different from the
> other disciplines that have been mentioned, in a way that physics, chemistry,
> biology and so on are not.