Full Idea
Mathematics hooks onto the world by providing representations in the form of structurally similar models.
Gist of Idea
Mathematics represents the world through structurally similar models.
Source
James Robert Brown (Philosophy of Mathematics [1999], Ch. 4)
Book Reference
Brown,James Robert: 'Philosophy of Mathematics' [Routledge 2002], p.49
A Reaction
This is Brown's conclusion. It needs notions of mapping, one-to-one correspondence, and similarity. I like the idea of a 'model', as used in both logic and mathematics, and children's hobbies. The mind is a model-making machine.