LSAT 108, Section 1, RC Passage 4, Math and Language

RC Passage 4 Explanation

Paragraph Summaries

1. Some people think that science is a process of using math to explain the real world.
2. Linguists disagree whether language refers to objects, or whether language is just a convention we agree on.
3. Some linguists think that a mathematical statement only means something once the scientific community accepts that it means something.
4. If language doesn’t refer to anything concrete, then what role does it play?

Analysis

This is the sort of passage you should read twice. Or even three times. Unclear ideas are shrouded in confusing language. It will do you no good to move on to the questions without understanding what the passage says.

The linguistic debate is the heart of the passage. Some linguists think that if I say “apple”, then I must be referring to the physical fruit. I’m referring to something real and concrete that exists.

Other linguists say that apple only means apple because we agree it does. So “apple” could just as easily mean “dog”, if we all agreed that that is what it meant.

The linguists in the last two paragraphs agree with this second interpretation. So a mathematical statement has new meaning once scientists accept that it has a meaning in the physical world.

i.e. E = mc2 has a different meaning once we accept that it refers to energy, mass and the speed of light. Before we accept that, it’s just an equation that has no real world meaning.

The fourth paragraph sums up the confusion. It’s no longer clear exactly what scientific language refers to. Language is clearly still useful, but we’re less sure exactly how. Science must investigate how our changing language contributes to scientific knowledge.