Many people are confused to people referring to mathematics as a science. When the word science is mentioned, most people think about people wearing large white lab coats and mixing mysterious liquids of unknown properties and huge explosions soon following, not some guy with glasses writing down numbers to find better ways of getting those numbers. But math is a science.
Before continuing I would like to refer to an interesting web comic.
http://www.xkcd.com/435/
this web comic projects mathematics as the purest science possible in a comical way. When closely studied, this all does make sense. Sociology is the use of mathematic formulate to understand human social structure and activity, and to use the knowledge heighten social welfare. But sociology is the study of the human nature and social patterns, so the application of sociology must require the use of psychology, for how do you understand the human social structure without understanding the human mind? Similarly, psychology uses biology, since psychology is simply understanding the brain chemistry within a person to understand their thoughts and anticipate their actions. Biology is even more dependent on chemistry because the study of biology is basically studying the chemical reactions within a biological body. So then chemistry becomes the understanding of interacting sub-atomic particles through physical formulas, and physics is really just calculating complex formulas to understand real life equations.
So yes, mathematics is not only a science, it is the foundation of all sciences. Imagine practicing any science without any prior knowledge of mathematics. The guy in lab coat mixing chemicals would have no ideas of how much chemicals to mix and would probably die. Even worse, nobody would understand why he died or what this particular manner of death means. Which would most likely be the worse possible thing that could happen to a scientist. The practice of mathematics is necessary for all scientists and is involved in all fields of science, and most people don’t give the credit mathematics deserves. Further more, the improvement of the understanding of math is used to improve the understanding of all fields and creates new branches of possibility for all.
These people not in lab coats worrying about how to cure cancer or to reach new frontiers in space travel is not often credited with the discoveries that their formulas make, but these mathematicians are very important to the world, and to science. So the next time you see a guy writing down random numbers of a notepad, at least understand it’s people like him/her who help make the world a more sensible place.
