[fantispug]

Math is a clean room where you don't need to worry about the concrete representation. Often the details of the representation and how they connect are more to do with human psychology (keeping things understandable) than with algorithmic heuristics.

[oggyhead]

I sincerely think that the minute you stop thinking that Math cannot be applied to a problem solving situation or Math is too fancy/theoretical, the Tower of Babylon type problems starts