Re: [FRIAM] Google+ Circles and Social Networks
Hi Grant, Google+ is maybe a good addendum to a mailing list. It is maybe not the perfect place for an elaborate discussion among peers, but it is easier if you want to share multimedia objects, i.e. if you want to post a link, a photo or a video, or if you want to make a quick comment. And it is interesting to check out a new technology. Are you on Google+, too? It is more a real threat for Facebook and Twitter, because it offers similar features, only better. -J. - Original Message - From: Grant Holland To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group Sent: Saturday, July 09, 2011 6:06 PM Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Google+ Circles and Social Networks Jochen, I hope this doesn't mean that we are now going to have two places to go to follow FRIAM conversations: The FRIAM mail alias AND a Google+ Circle!! Grant FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] The Grand Design, Philosophy is Dead, and Hubris
Your man Gower had some particularly good passages that suggesting that math’s ability to come to a usable conclusion depends on how it is interpreted, not only on the math itself. Yes indeed. In this case Sandel is discussing Utilitarianism, via Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill. In this case the Utilitarians needed a metric, a way to do two things: 1 - Apply a relationship between two events. Simple = triple would appear to work. In other words he needs to sort the value of the events using the greater than, less than and equal operators for pleasures. 2 - He then needs to aggregate them for groups to which the particular pleasure is to be measured in order to determine the common good. Here are the two key problems: 1 - Not all multi-dimensional spaces have a metric. I.e. its not always the case that a set of values for an experiment have metric values, they may simply be a collection of properties like Name = Owen, Age = 69, Sex = yes indeed, and so on. These are not easily sorted against a utilitarian pleasure even if modeled specifically for that pleasure. 2 - Even if you could sort, we've seen with Arrow's Impossibility theorem that for choices greater than two, there is no solution for the problem. This is why there is so much attention to fair voting and how to achieve it. Now all that is simply an illustration. I'm not attacking Utilitarianism, and indeed I enjoy the philosophic conversation that attends it and its laudable goal. However, I am a bit concerned that at least modern philosophers have not pointed out these two trivial objections and found at least a few classes of solutions. Indeed, as far as I can tell .. and I have looked .. this form of thinking is foreign to philosophers. I cannot tell from your example whether I would agree that your Harvard philopher is doing philosophy. He may be saying very wise things and not doing philosophy. If he starts somewhere, more or less arbitrarily, and shows how you can get somewhere else through sound argument, he is being a philopher, as well as being wise. ** ** Nick I do think he is doing original work, or at least did at Oxford during his degree. He now is primarily a teacher. -- Owen FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] The Grand Design, Philosophy is Dead, and Hubris
Owen—I'm afraid that scientists engineers like us have occasionally got to be on the receiving end of go read the book comments just as much as non-scientists who want to know about vortex formation... The contemporary utilitarians who are writing about this stuff include Judith Lichtenberg, Michalel Slote and Michael Stocker. Ones with a more theoretical bent include Peter Railton, Samuel Scheffler and Shelly Kagan. Google Scholar has links to their work. —R P.S. The paradigm case of consequentialism is utilitarianism says http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/consequentialism/. You many need to expand your search terms! On Sun, Jul 10, 2011 at 9:25 AM, Owen Densmore o...@backspaces.net wrote: snip Indeed, as far as I can tell .. and I have looked .. this form of thinking is foreign to philosophers. FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] Google+ Circles and Social Networks
/. on Google+ bug: http://goo.gl/SJq8G They experienced a server disk full which stimulated massive notifications. -- Owen FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] The Grand Design, Philosophy is Dead, and Hubris
As I have said before, I don't think go read the book is ever an appropriate response. One can choose not to participate, one can suggest books to be read, but I dislike the idea that one has to read the reading list before one can post a question to the friam list. But you all already know that. N From: friam-boun...@redfish.com [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Robert Holmes Sent: Sunday, July 10, 2011 11:44 AM To: Owen Densmore Cc: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group Subject: Re: [FRIAM] The Grand Design, Philosophy is Dead, and Hubris Owen-I'm afraid that scientists engineers like us have occasionally got to be on the receiving end of go read the book comments just as much as non-scientists who want to know about vortex formation... The contemporary utilitarians who are writing about this stuff include Judith Lichtenberg, Michalel Slote and Michael Stocker. Ones with a more theoretical bent include Peter Railton, Samuel Scheffler and Shelly Kagan. Google Scholar has links to their work. -R P.S. The paradigm case of consequentialism is utilitarianism says http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/consequentialism/. You many need to expand your search terms! On Sun, Jul 10, 2011 at 9:25 AM, Owen Densmore o...@backspaces.net wrote: snip Indeed, as far as I can tell .. and I have looked .. this form of thinking is foreign to philosophers. FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] The Grand Design, Philosophy is Dead, and Hubris
Hello, I really like the idea of a referral to an excellent book, or a even better, a specific chapter or short paper explaining an already solved problem. Its likely that a talented author has explain the idea or phenomenon more concisely then anyone on the list would have time to present. Though, It is really nice when someone does all the work of reading, understand, and summarizing a subject or topic for you, its a bit of a burden to place on someone. It certainly should not be expected, and when given should be received with gratitude. That being said, I'm wondering what are the active topics and open problems in philosophy, and where is progress being made, in the 21st century? Greg Sonnenfeld Junior programmers create simple solutions to simple problems. Senior programmers create complex solutions to complex problems. Great programmers find simple solutions to complex problems. The code written by topnotch programmers may appear obvious, once it is finished, but it is vastly more difficult to create. On Sun, Jul 10, 2011 at 2:39 PM, Nicholas Thompson nickthomp...@earthlink.net wrote: As I have said before, I don’t think go read the book is ever an appropriate response. One can choose not to participate, one can suggest books to be read, but I dislike the idea that one has to read the reading list before one can post a question to the friam list. But you all already know that. N From: friam-boun...@redfish.com [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Robert Holmes Sent: Sunday, July 10, 2011 11:44 AM To: Owen Densmore Cc: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group Subject: Re: [FRIAM] The Grand Design, Philosophy is Dead, and Hubris Owen—I'm afraid that scientists engineers like us have occasionally got to be on the receiving end of go read the book comments just as much as non-scientists who want to know about vortex formation... The contemporary utilitarians who are writing about this stuff include Judith Lichtenberg, Michalel Slote and Michael Stocker. Ones with a more theoretical bent include Peter Railton, Samuel Scheffler and Shelly Kagan. Google Scholar has links to their work. —R P.S. The paradigm case of consequentialism is utilitarianism says http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/consequentialism/. You many need to expand your search terms! On Sun, Jul 10, 2011 at 9:25 AM, Owen Densmore o...@backspaces.net wrote: snip Indeed, as far as I can tell .. and I have looked .. this form of thinking is foreign to philosophers. FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] Google+ Circles and Social Networks
Jochen, The level of interaction on Facebook is too high for my style, and the filtering through circles-of-trust mechanisms too low. After about 48 hours, I bailed from Facebook some months ago. I'm not on Google+, but the circle concept would seem to be the right approach. I would consider it. Maybe I should give it a whirl. However, I must confess that the mailing alias really is the level of interaction that I think I want from FRIAM (and from several other social networks to which I belong). Email with href links seems to work well. Grant On 7/10/11 3:13 AM, Jochen Fromm wrote: Hi Grant, Google+ is maybe a good addendum to a mailing list. It is maybe not the perfect place for an elaborate discussion among peers, but it is easier if you want to share multimedia objects, i.e. if you want to post a link, a photo or a video, or if you want to make a quick comment. And it is interesting to check out a new technology. Are you on Google+, too? It is more a real threat for Facebook and Twitter, because it offers similar features, only better. -J. - Original Message - From: Grant Holland To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group Sent: Saturday, July 09, 2011 6:06 PM Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Google+ Circles and Social Networks Jochen, I hope this doesn't mean that we are now going to have two places to go to follow FRIAM conversations: The FRIAM mail alias AND a Google+ Circle!! Grant FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
