[travisjungroth]

So in the viewpoint I’m describing you can definitely call it an abstraction. And abstraction has a vibe of intentionality to it, at least for me. That brings up something I didn’t mention, which is you can make a math game on purpose, to match with something in the real world. You can also make them up for fun (people don’t usually call it “for fun”, but that’s actually a fair label for theoretical mathematics IMO) and then discover the application later.

This is neat! I think it happens less in the physical world, just making up a tool and then finding its application later. It does happen in chemistry.