Quote Originally Posted by Vladimir
Heh. Lot of good replies, Viking, Kurki, et. al. Someone, I think it was Pape, put 2+4=4 in one of their posts. I really reject the notion that this is always the case. Two quarts of milk added to two quarts of milk is a gallon of milk. Saying that something "must be" just like 2+2 always "is" 4 is false because the premise is false.

I'm a big fan of it equaling one or five, the latter is refreshing. I've heard that Einstein failed math when he was younger. If that is so, I wondered if it was because he wasn't a genius until he was older or if he grappled with the same problem. Far too often we assume something is so because someone else says it is so.
2x+2x=4x

2y+2y=4y

As someone else said, arguing otherwise is going into the meaning of truth and knowledge, which is (IMO) as meaningless an exercise as any the Greeks ever devised.