When you speak about faith, you mix mathematics and convictions or religion on the other hand I think if you believe in math you're doing it wrong.
Seriously, are people allergic to the word "understand"?
All science is based on method and evidence.
A scientific claim, and mathematics claims are included, inherently contains rules explaining how it came about to be proven, and subsequently - based on evidence - how it might be refuted.
Faith... well... Does not.
I am (kind of) joking when I wrote this article, plus I often like to argue the side that I don't believe in, just to see what answers I get.
The fact is, you cannot see physical effects of mathematics on the world, therefore mathematics tends not to make predictions about the future, in the same way the other sciences do. Technically there is no way to verify that there will be mathematical discovery in the future, ergo if I believe that there will be, then I'm basing that belief on faith, and not evidence.
Like I said though, I don't genuinely believe that, I just like to put the Devil's Advocate argument forward, because challenging what I know on a daily basis, is exciting and refreshing to me :-)
Cg
Okay..For the next time I must be more aware of that .. nice way to provoke us to answer your (thoughts) :p
super fun follow-up to your last post and I for one enjoy your slightly tongue in cheek trains of thought whichever side you are arguing since I enjoy the way you think.