MATHEMATICAL VARIABLES AS INDIGENOUS CONCEPTS

This paper explores the semiotic status of algebraic variables. To do that we build on a structuralist and post-structuralist train of thought going from Mauss and Lévi-Strauss to Baudrillard and Derrida. We import these authors ’ semiotic thinking from the register of indigenous concepts (such as mana), and apply it to the register of algebra via a concrete case study of generating functions. The purpose of this experiment is to provide a philosophical language that can explore the openness of mathematical signs to reinterpretation, and bridge some barriers between philosophy of mathematics and critical approaches to knowledge.