All of this does feed into Global Warming, the topic here. Global Warming models are sophisticated physical models which use a lot of math, but as we are trying to show above, this is NOT the same as a purely mathematical model. It is just easier to do this with a few basic examples, rather than trying to jump to modeling something as ungodly complicated as the entire planet. After all, if we can't agree on how to compute the area of a room by multiplying two numbers together, how can we agree on how to apply really, really, REALLY complicated models to the entire planet?
In fact, I would actually say that this is the crux of the issue: how does one judge whether or not a model is wrong? After all, if we insist that they are purely mathematical, any tiny deviation means that they are "wrong". However, if we acknowledge that Global Warming models are physical models, then we have to start paying attention to uncertainties.
Basically, we have to determine whether or not the actual measurements deviate from the predictions given the uncertainties associated with the properties of the models that aren't purely mathematical. So this discussion is actually critically important.
Again...use a different analogy...because again you are WRONG.
FFS I have been doing this for 40 years.
There isn't any reason to get hostile over this, but he isn't wrong.
For example, a fairly common question in an introductory physics lab is to ask:
"What is the area of a 12m x 12m room?"
Students who write 144m lose the points because they are wrong in the context of experimental physics (and most other experimental sciences, in additional to many theoretical sciences). The correct answer is usually 140m, which is quite different than what you would get from a pure math.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Significance_arithmetic
Of course, significant figures are really just an approximation to the more sophisticated propagation of uncertainty, but the basic point is the same.
And anyway, I'm not saying this to be a jerk or to be confrontational about this. I taught this kind of stuff at universities of years, so I kind of care about it, and since I taught at universities for so many years, I actually do care about science literacy.
