Mathematics, like a musical score, is a language invented by the human mind. To see mathematics in action is to see God twice removed in everyday life. Would you rather lose yourself in the sound of the violin or see the action of horse hair on cow gut?
Interestingly, violin bows are made from horse hair and there are different bows which produce different sounds. The same is true for paintbrushes made from different type hair. If you are an artist you better know the difference between hog bristle and sable hair.
Sable: The ultimate soft brush is made from the hairs on the tail of a sable marten; these taper naturally, so when they're put into a brush they form a point. Sable brushes are expensive, but are renowned for their softness, flexibility, and fine point. Kolinsky sable from Siberia has traditionally been considered the best hair for watercolor brushes. They are good for painting fine details and very thin paint.
Squirrel: Cheaper than sable, squirrel is a soft hair with little spring. Larger squirrel brushes work better than smaller ones because the mass of hairs together gives them support.
Hog/bristle: These brushes are the workhorse of the oil painter. The ultimate hard brush is made from the hairs on the back of a pig (hog), which are strong yet springy. The bristles have natural split-ends, which increases the amount of paint they hold. They are good for loading with a lot of paint and painting impasto style and are used for both oils and acrylics. They age well, becoming softer and more responsive with use.
Camel: Brushes labeled 'camel' hair are really made from other types of soft hair. Camel hair is unsuitable for brushes because it is too woolly.
Ox: Long, strong and springy hair. It is most often used in flat shaped brushes.
Pony: Coarse hair that doesn't form a good point. Often used in cheaper watercolor brushes
Goat: Lacks spring, but forms a good point. Used in calligraphy and Chinese Brush painting.
Those are mathematical differences in properties of various paintbrushes.
But what you are completely overlooking is that composing and playing music itself is the mathematical use of sound waves. This is due to the fact that sound waves themselves are mathematical in essence and can be manipulated to produce specific harmonies constructed by the use of matheamatics.
This has been known for a long time, since the time of Pythagoras. If you have watched the video of “The Great Math Mystery - The Language Of The Universe” you will understand how humans came to recognize and symbolize the mathematical properties of all physical expressions in nature.
Human mathematics are the symbolic representation of universal mathematical relative values and functions. Remember that, it’ll change your perspective of natural phenomena, even those once viewed as divine miracles.
When you’re sailing, you know that you are using mathematical techniques to take advantage of the purely mathematical source of energy, the mathematical pattern of the boat, and the mathematical properties of water, no?
No math can even come near to approximating this divine miracle:
Everything you see in that movie is a result of mathematical patterns. Your emotional response is to the association of certain patterns with sexual memes.
But, of course physical responses themselves are a product of the mathematical production of certain chemicals in association with certain symbolic emotional responses.
Nope, I am cautioning you against becoming too self-absorbed. Healthy self-esteem is not a sin, its knowledge. Excessive self-indulgenge is a sin against yourself.
Write4U: Nope, I am cautioning you against becoming too self-absorbed. Healthy self-esteem is not a sin, its knowledge. Excessive self-indulgenge is a sin against yourself.
Would you rather lose yourself in the sound of the violin or see the action of horse hair on cow gut?
If you are simply aware of what you are doing when, this is really not a question. Not an either/or question anyway. I briefly mentioned the difference to Xian recently with the example of seeing someone wink, and either knowing the full context of that and all it's cultural implications, or just seeing it as muscles moving. It's sad to me, that people can't be aware of the science of light refraction and also enjoy the beauty of the rainbow. Why can't you see the horse hair and still lose yourself in that sound? The musician understands it.
Lausten: Why can’t you see the horse hair and still lose yourself in that sound? The musician understands it.
Indeed,
Moreover, knowing the mathematics of music composition allows for the creation of timeless symphonies.
Music theory has no axiomatic foundation in modern mathematics, yet the basis of musical sound can be described mathematically (in acoustics) and exhibits "a remarkable array of number properties".[1] Elements of music such as its form, rhythm and metre, the pitches of its notes and the tempo of its pulse can be related to the measurement of time and frequency, offering ready analogies in geometry.
The attempt to structure and communicate new ways of composing and hearing music has led to musical applications of set theory, abstract algebra and number theory. Some composers have incorporated the golden ratio and Fibonacci numbers into their work
A jingle selling Coca Cola; “I’d like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony”, is not a musical work of genius. (althought it rests on mathematics).
