Torkel Franzen on truth
in [Logic]
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From: MoeBlee on 9 Jan 2008 17:58 On Jan 9, 2:28 pm, george <gree...(a)cs.unc.edu> wrote: > > > On Jan 8, 4:40 pm, MoeBlee <jazzm...(a)hotmail.com> wrote: > > > > Moreover, do you at least see how what you're saying now about "you > > > > can do anything you want as long as consistent" goes against the grain > > > > of your continual harping ('harping' is putting nicely) that people > > > > are NOT within intellectual prerogative to go against the > > > > "paradigm" (as you've called it) and the presumed definitions? > > > > You have this exactly backwards. > > > *I* am going against the presumed definition in this case. > > > No, you have it backwards that I have it backwards. Read what I wrote > > again. I AM recognizing that you are challenging a presumed > > definition. > > Just because I can have it both ways doesn't mean that you can. > You have to approve of ONE or the other of these two sides that > you idiotically allege me to be inconsistently taking. PLEASE PICK > one. No, you STILL have it backwards. Are you doing this on purpose? Usually you say (I'm paraphrasing), "You (whomever you're posting to) don't get to just choose your definitions; you have to follow the conventions that are in the literature and are presumed to be the standard in sci.logic." Then I told someone a couple of definitions that rival as the presumed ones and I stated which one I choose between those. Then you faulted me for relying on what is presumed (which contradicts your usual fulminations that we are to use the presumed definitions are not to presume that we can just make up our own). So you make it impossible for anyone to fulfill your requirements: If they take your latest instruction to feel free to make up their own definitions, then you excoriate them for doing that and not complying with the presumed defintions and paradigm; but then when I did comply with the presumed defintion, you criticized me for doing that! Moreover, I'm not obligated to pick between following always presumed defintion or always taking complete liberty to make my own ersatz definitions. I already explained that I usually follow presumed definitions unless there is some special reason (perhaps having to do with the specifics of the particular treatment I'm using) and that I choose among different definitions that are in the literature on the basis of various considerations (and also sometimes just to make a choice so that I can move on to substantive matters and not spend my life worrying whether definition D by author A is "better" than Defintion D' by author A', especially since usually D has its advantages and disadvantages relative to D' and vice versa). And I haven't said that you must not allow yourself the same prerogative. And you contradict yourself AGAIN, when you say that YOU may be reasonable to challenge presumed defintions but that I wouldn't be, since a few posts back you just criticized ME for NOT challenging a presumed defintion. Whether intentionally or not, you make reasonable conversation with you IMPOSSIBLE. Your posting verges on the insane. > In any case, your whining about my "continual harping" in order > to win a pissing contest here is not going to score any points. It's not whining. I'm telling you flat out, in your face, you're being a boob and a bore. And I've told you I'm not in any "pissing contest" with you. And I don't say things to you to "score points". > You have no idea who the judges/audience are. I have some idea. I have a pretty good appreciation of the range of people who post here and can guess as to the range of people who are reading. > I have been here > for over 20 years. How sad it's been twenty years of you posting in the really very very messed up way you do. > Challenging at least a few pet peeved definitions > is something I have been doing for most of that time. And I have no objection to you or anyone saying what they don't like about certain definitions, or proposing others, or reasonable things along those lines. > Obviously > I therefore cannot believe that people cannot challenge these > definitions. If you say I am proving, continually, that I believe > that, then you simply don't know what's going on. You don't recognize how very bizarre your postings are. MoeBlee
From: MoeBlee on 9 Jan 2008 18:16 On Jan 9, 2:32 pm, george <gree...(a)cs.unc.edu> wrote: > > > On Jan 8, 4:40 pm, MoeBlee <jazzm...(a)hotmail.com> wrote: > > > > I'm not obsessed with authors. > > > > Of course you are. > > > Fatuous. > > It's exemplified by your behavior. > It's factually confirmed. Whether it is or isn't also > "fatuous" is entirely moot, if it's factual. As I said, fatuous. That I have a strong interest in what various writers in the subject of mathematics have to say doesn't entail that I'm obsessed with authors. > > > > It's just > > > > that this subject is mainly disseminated through lectures and > > > > writings, and primarily, for those who are not gathered in a single > > > > lecture series, widely used textbooks provide > > > > the most common basis > > > > for definitions. > > Now THAT'S fatuous. > BECAUSE it's factual. > It's about as fatuous as responding to "what is your name?" > with "The sky is blue." OF COURSE it is true that the > textbooks say what they say. OF COURSE it is also true > that what they say is itself also true. But EVERYBODY > KNOWS THAT ALREADY. Wherefore it is fatuous (to put > it charitably) to BELABOR any of it. Because, YOUR ludicrous charge that I am obsessed is rebutted by mentioning the obvious. Since the primary way I learn about this subject is by authors, I am interested to note differences among authors so that I don't get confused by those differences and also can understand someone whose touchpoint is a different textbook or author. Wait, that is obvious too! Yes, such things are so obvious that it is amazing that you don't already see that they obviate your charge even before you make it! > > > That is just out of touch with reality. > > > > If somebody is asking YOU what a term means then > > > YOU are the ONLY basis for a definition. If you choose > > > to defer to "widely used textbooks" then that is YOUR choice. > > > Oh, come on! > > No, dumbass, I will NOT come on: YOU come on. > > > The poster asked me what a term means. > > SO? > There is such a thing as a stupid question. > There is also such a thing as a question that > overlooks something important or presumes something that, > despite its conventionality, still NEEDS to be rejected. > IF you are going to comment then YOU need to come on > AND PAY ATTENTION to those sorts of things. I had no basis to think it was anything other than a legitimately posed question. And I do pay a reasonable amount of attention to context, but I do not accept your dicate that I may not also comment to a plain question with a plain answer whatever the context. > > I took that to be a request > > It never matters what anybody is actually requesting. > What matters is what they NEED. You still don't get it. I do not obligate myself to determine what is the exact thing each person most needs in every conversation. I am not a paid tutor (and I don't pretend that anyone would take me for any kind of tutor, either by my posting style or by the obvious limitations of my knowledge). No one is obligated by YOU or by anyone else to deliver responses that are only maximally tutorial. And, for that matter, as far as tutoring is concerned, you are about the worst I have ever read here: both in style and content. MoeBlee
From: Aatu Koskensilta on 10 Jan 2008 05:20 On 2008-01-09, in sci.logic, george wrote: > That IS JUST STUPID. Right. Chang & Keisler's definition is STUPID, the downward L�wenheim-Skolem theorem shows that the upward L�wenheim-Skolem theorem is stupid and so on. Perhaps you're using "stupid" in some technical sense I'm unaware of? -- Aatu Koskensilta (aatu.koskensilta(a)xortec.fi) "Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, daruber muss man schweigen" - Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
From: Alan Smaill on 16 Jan 2008 14:24 george <greeneg(a)cs.unc.edu> writes: >> > On Jan 5, 11:48 am, Alan Smaill <sma...(a)SPAMinf.ed.ac.uk> wrote: >> >> there are simnply no grounds there for saying that *TF* believed that >> >> the axioms of ZFC are clearly true, as you suggest. >> >> > OF course there are. >> >> Then please tell me where you find these grounds, >> because they are not to be found in the passage cited. > > OF course they are. repetition does not add to your case. > Besides, the issue isn't even "truth" to begin with. > The issue is TF's insistence on treating "truth" like it is > coherent or reasonably understood. My issue is mundanely with the claim that *this passage* gives grounds for saying that TF claims that the axioms of ZF are clearly true. If your complaint is that he treats the notion as coherent, then I agree he does so, but that doesn't mean he (here) treats the position as true. >> > Even worse, there are grounds for thinking that TF endorses >> > the position that "manifestly true" is even meaningful, which >> > is, in the context of formal languages, stupid. >> >> He is not talking about formal languages here; > > I can't help it if you can read the book carefully and closely and > still lie about it. The axioms ARE WRITTEN IN a formal language. > He therefore CANNOT avoid being ABOUT formal languages. I took your assertion to mean that the topic at hand is uninterpreted formal languages considered purely syntactically. That is not what is going on. The more important point is that TF is here arguing *hypothetically* -- what follows **if** someone takes this position? > That IS his subject matter. That IS SO TO what he was talking > about. If you are actually reading the book and still disputing > this then there is little hope of an actual discussion. Formal languages are involved, but not *just* formal languages in (what I take to be) your sense. >> he is assuming, for the >> purposes of discussion, that the someone adopts the position that the >> axioms are true statements > > This DOES NOT CHANGE the fact that those statements > ARE WRITTEN IN A FORMAL LANGUAGE. yes, they are. >> about the (assumed) world of sets. > > But assuming the existence of any such world is, I repeat, STUPID. It's consistent with everything on p106 of "G's theorem" that TF agrees with you that the existence of any such world is "STUPID". From the page in question: ".. we need to distinguish between two things: what degree of skepticism or confidence regarding mathematical axioms or methods or reasoning is justifiable or reasonable, and what bearing G�del's theorem has on the matter. Perhaps we take a dim view of the claim that we know with absolute certainty the truth of, say, the axioms of ZFC, but how can we use G�del's theorem to criticise this claim?" > If anyone tries to assume THAT then the simple refutation is > "what is a set? I don't get these "sets" you're trying to talk > about." > ALL anyone CAN do by way of replying to that is GIVE A FORMAL > LANGUAGE, which IS going to have MULTIPLE interpretations. Or maybe someone might try to bring G�del's theorem to bear. That is what TF is on about here. > That is just the end of it. -- Alan Smaill
From: george on 17 Jan 2008 11:08
On Jan 16, 2:24 pm, Alan Smaill <sma...(a)SPAMinf.ed.ac.uk> wrote: > It's consistent with everything on p106 of "G's theorem" > that TF agrees with you that the existence of any such > world is "STUPID". Well, you have the page and I don't, but I still doubt you here. "any such world" is ambiguous. I am trying to deny 1 world and he is trying to deny another, I expect. > From the page in question: > > ".. we need to distinguish between two things: > what degree of skepticism or confidence regarding mathematical > axioms or methods or reasoning is justifiable or reasonable, Absolutely NO degree, OBVIOUSLY. That he is even entertaining this is, well, tragic & typical; but what is even MORE of both of the above is that THAT issue winds up getting CONFLATED with the SEPARATE issue of TRUTH. > and what bearing Gödel's theorem has on the matter. Perhaps > we take a dim view of the claim that we know with absolute > certainty the truth of, say, the axioms of ZFC, but how > can we use Gödel's theorem to criticise this claim?" Via the model existence theorem, obviously. This is completely easy and straightforward; indeed it is a matter almost purely of definition. As you are presenting his argument here it is worse than incoherent -- it is just the opposite of sound. > > ALL anyone CAN do by way of replying to that is GIVE A FORMAL > > LANGUAGE, which IS going to have MULTIPLE interpretations. > > Or maybe someone might try to bring Gödel's theorem to bear. That is NOT an ALTERNATIVE, dangit! Giving a formal language with multiple interpretations *constitutes* bringing Godel's theorem to bear! |