SIDELIGHTS ON RELATIVITY

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which is known by the name of mathematical logic or "Axiomatics."
The progress achieved by axiomatics consists in its having neatly
separated the logical-formal from its objective or intuitive
content; according to axiomatics the logical-formal alone forms
the subject-matter of mathematics, which is not concerned with the
intuitive or other content associated with the logical-formal.

Let us for a moment consider from this point of view any axiom of
geometry, for instance, the following:--Through two points in space
there always passes one and only one straight line. How is this
axiom to be interpreted in the older sense and in the more modern
sense?

The older interpretation:--Every one knows what a straight line
is, and what a point is. Whether this knowledge springs from an
ability of the human mind or from experience, from some collaboration
of the two or from some other source, is not for the mathematician