Me in high school: yeah physics and math have a crazy amount of overlap and, you know, in a lot of ways, they talk about the same thing.
Me now, a physics major asking a math major something: I'm sorry what the actual fuck did you just say? What are those words? Why are you speaking like this? Can't you just explain it with numbers?
Me, a math major talking to a physics major: Iâm sorry, WHAT? You just hand-wave the math? You canât do that!
Have you heard the phrase "general mathematical niceness" yet?
No, whatâs that?
It's an assumption made in some physics theorems. Basically it's "this function doesn't have anything weird going on. It's in whatever Sobolev space would make sense, y'know?" I recall using the phrase in a seminar with a bunch of mathematicians and causing a small uproar.
I once heard someone justify math using âthe hand-wave theoremâ and needless to say the pure math people recognize many theorems but not that one.
