Defining the nature of rational discussion!

[Doctordick]

Well, to make a long story short, I bought a scanner, scanned an image at too high a resolution, went to print the image through a quirky software program which overran a buffer managed to write into a protected area and killed my printing capability. The computer worked fine but I couldn't even pull up the "printers and faxes" control panel; it was like it wasn't there. I used the recovery to move back to an earlier image but didn't get the panel back. Went to restore to factory state and discovered the disks had been scratched. Finally managed to restore the whole thing from dead scratch (I'm pretty good if I say so myself. My wife said I should just go buy a new one.) So I have been busy for a few days. :P

 

Meanwhile, there has been some activity here so I'll get on with it. ;)

So by definition an internal explanation has congruent terms, but that might not be true for external explanations.

I presume here that you are talking about "internally consistent communications". With regard to external explanations, we can only try for "congruent terms" and that is why I say only communications in mathematics should be regarded as decently well defined. As UV-gap has commented,

To have a "rational discussion" you, or someone else, has to find a way that makes everyone on the planet read the same words the same way all the time. GOOD LUCK.

the "words" (or, in mathematics that would be "symbols") must be read the same way all the time. Hopefully, mathematics is up to the task; at least more effort has been expended towards that goal than in any other language. :)

you are talking about Intuition vs. Thought. rational discussion *should* emphasize Thought more than Intuition.

I think you missed my thrust entirely. Thought is what you think and, without induction (or intuition as you call it) there can be none. And before you start taking about things being "truer" you need to tell me how to determine what is true. :P

since you already have the credentials in physics, you should definitely check out philosophy of all kinds...i mean actually read what the major philosophers in every culture have written in the last millenia.

And learn what? About their failures? Give me some examples of their successes if you expect any interest on my part. :lol:

After over 25 years as an MD-specialist I took "the Devil's short-cut to Enlightenment." ... complete and content, mostly because there are no questions.

Sounds a lot like "ignorance is bliss" to me. :lol:

but what they think changes minute to minute as does what you think, let alone what you think they thought but no longer think.

So you give up easily? Ok, that a choice you are free to make. :D

UV, are you saying that you already know everything, or that you don't need to know anything other than what you already know?

I doubt he thinks he already knows everything so that pretty well leaves "don't need to know anything" to be happy: as I said, ignorance is bliss. But seriously, as I commented in my first post, intuition ("squirrel thought") is the single most important component of successful survival (and, by the way, that includes happiness). ;)

i, too, would like to be content.

If that is really your desire, I know of some drugs which will provide it will little difficulty. Oh yes, UV-gap, after 25 years in medicine (unless I misunderstood "MD") may be well aware of those opportunities. As an aside on confusion, before I retired I happened to be on a small business jet with some other businessmen and there was one guy who kept talking about how important his "BM's" were. The initials, "BM", seemed to me to appear in inappropriate places in his discourse so I finally asked him what "BM" stood for. He answered, "well 'business meeting' of course!" That isn't what it meant when I was growing up but it sure does discribe a lot of "business meetings" I have been to. :lol: :lol:

But if you want to know anything about “fiction,” this nothing, then I am by far the greatest expert that ever lived, or will live.

I sincerely doubt that; and I mean "sincerely". :hihi: :hihi:

ALL IS the perfection of the timeless NOW.

And that is your explanation of your perceptions and your experiences? Save it; I have no use for it. :P

Dick, are your equations congruent to a Turing Machine?

I think he's got it! The answer is, in many respects, yes. The problem with Turing's Machine is that it has no imagination; that is, what it is allowed to do is all it is allowed to do. In essence it is operating with a fixed known starting point on that tape. However, in the collection of all possible Turing "Programs" there must be one which can be seen as indifferent to it's starting point. That tape cannot be seen as a totally random structure. It must be possible to see as portions or patterns which are required to be there and portions which are not so required. Those not required to exist can be thought of as "imaginative". It's all on how you look at things. My central concern is the limitations on possibilities with regard to such a structure (the structure being the data: the marks on the tape, both real and imagined). :lol:

 

But a serious discussion of the relationship between my work and Turing's should be put off until you understand what I am trying to present. The first issue which I have been trying to get to the forefront of discussion has to do with the vanishing of the total derivative of that probability function expressing expectations. That proof follows from my subtle extension of Noether's theorem. I had a conversation with a poster called "saviormachine" on physicsforums which displays my arguments behind that extension. :)

 

My first post concerning Noether's theorem. SelfAdjoint posted a good response.

The difference between ignorance and indifference. My response to SelfAdjoint's comment following my last post.

The expression of the fundamental use I make of the theorem. This post plus a few following it substantially express my derivation of my proof. :evil:

 

Reading that collection of posts should pretty well fill you in on the first step of my presentation of "An Explanation"

 

What I want you all to do is understand that first step. I think I have put in enough support in those posts referenced to defend what I am saying. Anyone who thinks there is a flaw in my argument please bring the issue up. If you can't understand what I am presenting, tell me what you don't understand. For the moment, don't worry why I am putting these relationships forward as I have two more basic relationships to introduce before we finish my abstract model of an explanation. Without that model, we have nothing to work with. :shrug:

 

Joy at the sight of a rainbow.

That's the joy I would like to show you all. Why we are able to see rainbows. ;)

 

Looking to hear from some of you -- Dick

 

Again, what I am presenting is actually quite simple so don't over interpret it. :lol:

[Khan N. Singh]

And learn what? About their failures? Give me some examples of their successes if you expect any interest on my part.

 

well it'd all be theories. philosophers are usually way ahead of the technology curve. you can't really prove/disprove a lot of these things within your lifetime (perhaps ever).

 

you said you wanted to 'understand' the universe. and you go into length about various subjective ways of reasoning (emotions vs. logic, and the nature of logical thought itself). that's not something you can have success/failure with. that is philosophy, not physics. and if you wanna philosophize, you should read what people wrote before you if you don't want to get discarded like all the upstarts. or maybe neurology. maybe you really do want to just 'do physics'?

[ldsoftwaresteve]

Khan:

you should read what people wrote before you if you don't want to get discarded like all the upstarts.

Why? We only have so much time and two hundred years from now there will just be a lot more of..'what people wrote before you' ...so your argument becomes somewhat absurd. We simply can't read it all.

So I don't agree with you on that basis alone.

We need a better way and hopefully a 'child' of forums like this will come to pass and we will have some way of applying some sort of 'razor' to the volumes of bullshit, which I'm sorry to say that in my opinion most of it (philosophy) is. Not all of it, certainly, but most of it.

[ldsoftwaresteve]

DoctorDick, I suspect I have a better understanding of what you're saying than I probably realize. My problem is getting that into congruent terminology. The Turing machine posts have clarified some of it for me because that is the feel I had when I read your original post on that, although I've never heard of it before.

The concept of a process that can just, uh, 'run' starting anywhere is really good design. I try to do my billing systems where the data drives the process. Now obviously it can't, completely, because my data is very limited in nature. :lol: I know it's just a vague echo of what you're trying to get across here but there is a real connection for me. Ultimately, your process will be limited by the nature of the input to that process.

I have a question on mathematics. Everything depends on your basic assumptions, your components. If they are accurate, then assuming the rules of mathematics are universal and unchanging, it just becomes a matter of seeing where they lead.

And, isn't it true that the range is dependent on the accuracy of the assumptions? The end of a branch holds less weight and the stress on the assumptions becomes leveraged.

So whenever I am tempted to make the leap, my habit is to put on the brakes because I worry that the chasm over which i'll be flying is an optical illusion. I hate heights.

[UV-gap]

Our minds

 

.

 

Quote:

Originally Posted by UV-gap

But if you want to know anything about “fiction,” this nothing, then I am by far the greatest expert that ever lived, or will live.

 

I sincerely doubt that; and I mean "sincerely".

.

 

“Sincerely” is just like “doubt,” a word, fiction, nothing. I am the Supreme Expert on this subject of Nothing, words.

You my dearest Pyrotex seem to be an expert on everything else which, the joke is, are also words, nothing, fiction, but you are too smart to know it.

 

YOU seem to be such an expert that you must be about a 15 year old idiot-savant that has so much wisdom and knowledge that you have forgotten that there are two other words that “wisdom and knowledge” needs to add up to the nothing but words: stupidity and ignorance.

And these words “stupidity and ignorance “are the best words, fiction, nothing, that I need to be the supreme expert on nothing, words, fiction.

 

I am the supreme stupidity that you might one day wake up to, and even die laughing at … but you will never ever know.

 

-- UV-gap

[Pyrotex]

Damn it, UV!! Now you have blown my cover, and I'll have to go find another Forum website to play in. And just when I was beginning to like you... :lol:

[Khan N. Singh]

Khan: Why? We only have so much time and two hundred years from now there will just be a lot more of..'what people wrote before you' ...so your argument becomes somewhat absurd. We simply can't read it all.

So I don't agree with you on that basis alone.

We need a better way and hopefully a 'child' of forums like this will come to pass and we will have some way of applying some sort of 'razor' to the volumes of bullshit, which I'm sorry to say that in my opinion most of it (philosophy) is. Not all of it, certainly, but most of it.

 

you can read a lot of it. it doesn't take that long to read the books of the major philosophers. its better to have a starting point. they might have thought stuff you haven't, that you agree with.

[UV-gap]

Damn it, UV!! Now you have blown my cover, and I'll have to go find another Forum website to play in. And just when I was beginning to like you... :lol:

 

Don't like me, and don't waste your time hating me, just laugh at me. And if you laugh hard enough you will Realize that I AM the funniest person on earth because I AM U.

[ldsoftwaresteve]

Khan:

you can read a lot of it. it doesn't take that long to read the books of the major philosophers. its better to have a starting point. they might have thought stuff you haven't, that you agree with.

Well, you see, I don't think so. Two people can read the same thing and get different impressions and understanding assuming they come away from the experience with anything at all worth having. So I guess Khan, I'm skeptical. It isn't that they don't have something to say, it's that I might not hear it for whatever reason. Also, if they were any good, wouldn't the world of people make a hell of a lot more sense than it does today?

 

And there aren't any shortcuts. To truly understand something I have to walk the whole road myself.

 

I think the epitomy of loneliness is to stand on top of the mountain and not be able to share the experience. DoctorDick, I suspect, is in that exact position. I can hear him yelling up there but I'll be damned if I can find the road.

[Doctordick]

philosophers are usually way ahead of the technology curve.

Oh, "way ahead" are they? I never heard it put that way before. :P :lol: Businessmen seldom take advice from people who don't comprehend what monetary transactions are; and I don't take my "philosophy" from people who don't comprehend what general relativistic translations are. Ignorance is ignorance and I would expect MY "guru" to answer "all" my questions. But, more important than that, I want to comprehend the answers myself. What was the question again? :P :P

My problem is getting that into congruent terminology.

I am presuming that would be having a congruent concept to what I have when I refer to A, B and C. From that perspective, let's look at the issues again. I am talking about a solution to the problem of understanding the universe from an abstract perspective (that is, I am looking at the solution from an abstract perspective). If we had that solution, we could explain it. To explain it we would need a language (a collection of concepts capable of expressing our understanding). Without knowing anything about that explanation, I can say a few things about it which have an extremely high probability of being true (perhaps even absolutely true). First, there is a serious probability that the explanation (no matter what that explanation may be) is wrong: i.e., future information may change our opinion. :lol: (Can you seriously fault that?)

 

We thus deduce that the explanation is based on less than all the information which might become available to us and, furthermore, the actual "information available to us" can change. Since we cannot presume we knew anything when the problem first arose, we can deduce that the "information available to us" is the result of the accumulated changes in "information available to us". So the collection of particular changes in "information available to us" become a very significant "thing" to think about (that would be what I call B). B constitutes "Now!" Is that not congruent to a familiar concept in your head? :P

 

But, I have no idea what B is! I do know that, if I had that language (that collection of concepts necessary to express our understanding), I could express what B is. If I knew those concepts, and wanted to communicate what B was, I would need a label for each of those concepts (words in a language). So B can be seen as an instance of a collection of concepts. What do I need to in order to label those concepts? French words? English words? Or perhaps some words from a language not yet conceived of. Since I don't have any idea what those words might be, let me just refer to them as "word #1", "word #2", "word #3" ... "word #n". Ah, but note, it has to be a finite set. :lol:

 

Since the collection of all B's constitute all the information available to you, the definition of those words must be implied by the collection of B's themselves (contained in the "information available to us"). One would hope that there is only one interpretation which would make your experiences (the entire collection of known B's) make sense. What is important here is that the actual symbols used to represent those concepts is immaterial; language is an artificial construct learned via "changes" in the "information available to us". I can use any collection of labels I want including a simple collection of numbers. (If this bothers you, think of my labeling as a secret numerical code for those words in that universal language created by the people who think they understand the universe; note that, as I said above, they could be wrong.)

 

Now I don't know what concepts are required to make that coherent explanation, but I do know that (if I happen to have exactly the correct assignment of those numbers: i.e., every time a particular concept appeared as part of a particular B it would have the same label) I could create exactly the explanation "created by the people who think they understand the universe" (their explanation should be in that collection of "nows" if I have had enough communications). The only difference between us would be the symbols I used for their concepts or my failure to understand them :lol: (think of a collection of ascII codes).

 

There is an important fact embedded in the above presentation. The fact that the correct assignment of numbers does not require a specific determined set of numbers. Again, languages are artificial constructs, if I had all my numerical labels assigned correctly, then I could do two things: first, given a set of numerical labels, I could express exactly what concepts were included in any specific B (their meanings are contained in "all the information I know") and I could also specify the expectation that particular B is consistent with the explanation; i.e., P(B, t).

 

Suppose I changed all my numerical labels by adding some number "a" (I am still using that "correct" assignment mentioned above", just adding "a" to each and every word). How does this change anything? I can still deduce the meanings of my new labels (from the complete collection of B's which constitute "all the information I know") and the change cannot possibly change the probability of any particular B. Please read the second half of my post to saviormachine and explain to me what is (in your mind) wrong with my assertion that the total derivative of P(B, t) must vanish. I hold that this fact has utterly nothing to do with what that explanation is, it is merely statement of ignorance concerning the absolute correctness of a given numerical labeling of concepts. :lol: Now the next step is making sure the explanation works; that one is a lot more fun. :P

 

A is the universe (which is the collection of things which are expressed by that collection of concepts which are required to understand the universe); B is the change in what we know (the present, expressed by the collection of concepts which have been developed in our creation of our current understanding of the universe) and C constitutes everything we know (the collection of all the "nows" we have become aware of expressed again by the collection of concepts which our experiences have led us to).

I have a question on mathematics. Everything depends on your basic assumptions, your components. If they are accurate, then assuming the rules of mathematics are universal and unchanging, it just becomes a matter of seeing where they lead.

And, isn't it true that the range is dependent on the accuracy of the assumptions? The end of a branch holds less weight and the stress on the assumptions becomes leveraged.

Yes, I would agree with that, but what assumptions am I making. What I am doing is "working with unknowns"; I have gone far out of my way to make sure nothing is establish as known.

So whenever I am tempted to make the leap, my habit is to put on the brakes because I worry that the chasm over which i'll be flying is an optical illusion. I hate heights.

The only chasm here is the realization that the collection of symbols used to represent the language is immaterial and you, as a programmer, should understand the truth of that statement (at least from the perspective of the machine language representation of anything). :P

I can hear him yelling up there but I'll be damned if I can find the road.

My solution is analytic and not at all intuitive. Right now, what I want you to understand is that first step, way down there at the bottom of the mountain. As someone once said, the longest trip starts with one step. And actually, this trip is not very long. Crazy as it may seem, I think you would love the view from up here.

I know it's just a vague echo of what you're trying to get across here but there is a real connection for me. Ultimately, your process will be limited by the nature of the input to that process.

Not really my progress. What I am looking at IS the limits imposed on the process of understanding the universe and generating some very general constraints on that process which turn out to be quite surprising. In much the same vein as Newton's results when he considered the possibility that the moon was freely falling towards the earth. The results of his analysis were not at all what everyone at the time expected.

 

Have fun -- Dick

[Doctordick]

Sorry, this could be deleted. I am still having trouble with long posts.

[Khan N. Singh]

Well, you see, I don't think so. Two people can read the same thing and get different impressions and understanding assuming they come away from the experience with anything at all worth having. So I guess Khan, I'm skeptical. It isn't that they don't have something to say, it's that I might not hear it for whatever reason. Also, if they were any good, wouldn't the world of people make a hell of a lot more sense than it does today?

 

well my entire point is YOU people specifically should try philosophizing on your own :P so if you want to attack philosophers, attack yourselves. time better spent, imho.

 

and to do that, you should be somewhat familiar with major philosophical views of the last couple centuries, so you don't restate concepts others have already come up with. hell, a few minutes on wikipedia is enough to familiarize yourself with anybody.

 

also they are extremely easy to understand. i doubt you'd have trouble not hearing what they are trying to say. especially those that published books expressly for this purpose.

 

I don't take my "philosophy" from people who don't comprehend what general relativistic translations are

 

so you also think guys like Descartes are full of bullshit? i mean obviously we all here have contributed much more to science than that guy. :lol: his brain's inferior. fool didn't even know about relativity at all, and was so wrong about so many other things.

 

and like i said, i wasn't asking you to 'take' philosophy. the best spirit of philosophy is that of consulting, critiquing, and reconciling your own philosophy with others. so many have started up just because of critiquing of other philosophers, and have still been considered influential/important because they struck a chord with so many people.

[Doctordick]

... so you don't restate concepts others have already come up with.

Believe me, I am quite confident that I am not restating anything "others have already come up with". If I were, I am sure they would have understood the consequences and I have seen not the first sign of that. :P

 

Scientists in general (and I am a scientist) tend to dismiss philosophy as just so much "contemplating your navel" leading, for the most part, utterly nowhere (not worth supporting financially anyway). Why do you think they have that opinion? Sure, some philosophers have made some valid statements but, for the most part, anyone reasonably intelligent is well aware of such things. I have had a deep interest in philosophy (understanding itself) for over sixty years already and have thought about a lot of things. I have also read a number of those people regarded as important in the field. In every case, my impression has been the same: most of what they have to say is not very well thought out. :P

 

On the other hand, I think it you might find it helpful to learn a little about the idea behind the concept thought of as "exact science". :lol:

 

Thank you; but no thank you -- Dick :P

[questor]

Dr. Dick, i would like to ponder your theory or whatever you call it. we are now in the 150th post with innumerable words and questions, and i will bet that no one here can recapitulate your theory with 3 or 4 paragraphs. if your information is so difficult to understand by the intelligent people on this site, how will it be perceived by the regular public? i realize that you think this is a unique and perhaps break-through type manner of observing events,and i was wondering if you could give sort of an overview, or ''big picture'' of your

idea?

[Turtle]

Dr. Dick, i would like to ponder your theory or whatever you call it. we are now in the 150th post with innumerable words and questions, and i will bet that no one here can recapitulate your theory with 3 or 4 paragraphs. if your information is so difficult to understand by the intelligent people on this site, how will it be perceived by the regular public? i realize that you think this is a unique and perhaps break-through type manner of observing events,and i was wondering if you could give sort of an overview, or ''big picture'' of your

idea?

 

___Here here! Why do we all fail to understand such a "simple" thing after such a long time?

___I think my posts are "rational", & the thread we agreed is a discussion. Therfore, Dr. Dick's model must account for my "rationality", but he has rationalized my posts as interuptions. I am an accomplished, albeit ameteur, arithmetician schooled both in & out of academia in dozens of areas of discrete mathematics; more than a dozen regular members here at Hypogrpahy outstrip my knowledge by magnitudes. I note none of them has posted to the thread, but I suspect they all read it regularly.

___The point you may have missed Dr. Dick is that I am a precosious savant, & I don't reason like you or most others. Still, if your model is all you say, you must account for me. I am not a squirrel. I am accustomed to reading deep lengthy treatises on mathematics & proffering my account of them. Please by all means jump to the difficult math you have alluded to.

 

Having Fun,

Turtle

 

PS DD, have you spent as much time reading my threads as I have yours? Maybe if you got to know me better?

[Doctordick]

When I was young and in my prime

I used to push it all the time

When I got old and got more sense

I tried to get 'em off the fence. :hihi:

 

Thank you questor, for showing a serious interest. I think I have read most all your posts and find you to be a very conscientious and thoughtful person. The problem here is really that there is nothing to "ponder". All I have to offer is a bit of straight forward logic. What seems to be "so difficult to understand" are my arguments as to why one should be interested in following that logic. My problem seems to be much more akin to the problems had by Daniel and Keren Everett had trying to teach counting to the Pirahã. In that entire list of 150 posts you comment about, not one response has shown any concern with the validity of the first step in that logic though I can easily point to a dozen times I have tried to bring it up; instead, every time I try, my post is followed by whole series of posts subtly changing the subject to some obscure philosophical point.

i realize that you think this is a unique and perhaps break-through type manner of observing events

Then you "realize" incorrectly; what I am trying to demonstrate are the exact limits imposed on our theories by that simple definition of "an explanation" I have put forth. The definition is quite simple; it is "an explanation is a method of obtaining expectations from given known information". :lol:

 

Step #1 of the proof of my fundamental equation:

First I insist that every method can be seen as a way of expressing "expectations" in terms of the probabilities of observations (which I now call "changes in information").

Second, since the language is arbitrary, the observations can be expressed via a set of numbers (i.e., a language consisting of numerical tags) and the "method" can be reduced to a mathematical function.

It is then simple to prove that the total derivative of that function must vanish. :evil:

 

The first two sentences seem to me to be obvious. If they are not to you, please explain your difficulty. The proof that the derivative vanishes is a little more subtle but I think the best exposition of it can be found in the second half of my post to "saviormachine". You can omit everything prior to "As I said in my previous post...". If you read it, you will note a sentence at the bottom: "Please, think that all over a little and let me know if you have any problems with it." To date, no one has apparently had "any problems with it". They just don't want to talk about it. :lol: :lol:

 

You want the "big picture"? Take a look at An Analytical Model of Explanation Itself. It is a straight forward proof that any explanation of anything can be represented by a solution to the equation stated at the end of that paper. It's a simple step by step proof. :hihi:

 

Now, when you start working out the solutions of that equation (which are not at all trivial), you obtain some rather astonishing results. But that takes serious time and effort. That equation is to modern physics what Maxwell's equation was to electricity and magnetism. And the way in which those solutions arise (the approximations which must be made) tell one a lot about the universe (mainly, the assumptions we have made in constructing our world view). :lol:

 

Have fun -- Dick

 

"The simplest and most necessary truths are the very last to be believed."

by Anonymous

[Doctordick]

___Here here! Why do we all fail to understand such a "simple" thing after such a long time?

That is something I have wondered about myself and the only thing which seems to make any sense is the Pirahã problem. :lol:

Please by all means jump to the difficult math you have alluded to.

First, do you follow my deduction of the equation at the end of An Analytical Model of Explanation Itself? If you find a flaw in that deduction, generating solutions to the equation seems to me to be somewhat of a waste of time and I would prefer you understood the proof; however, if you really want to the solutions issue, I am willing. Tell me how you would attack the problem of solving that equation and I will take you seriously. :evil:

 

And, by the way, I did appologize for misinterpreting your "Venn" comment. As I said, I didn't realize that you didn't understand the definitions of A, B and C. From reading your posts, I know very well that you are not dumb.

 

Have fun – Dick's

 

"The simplest and most necessary truths are the very last to be believed."

by Anonymous