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Mathematics is like nothing else. The truths of math seem to be unrelated to anything else—independent of human beings, independent of the universe. The sum of 2 + 3 = 5 cannot not be true; this means that 3 + 2 = 5 would be true even if there were never any human beings, even if there were never a universe! When then, deeply, is mathematics?

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Mark Balaguer is Professor of Philosophy at California State University, Los Angeles. His major book is Platonism and Anti-Platonism in Mathematics.