Thanks, Bruno, for your helping effort. It did not do too much for me because it started out with 'assuming comp' which means: we need nothing more than (number) trivialities and (as you wrote): > Numbers protects the free mind against a *vast* > class of reductionism....< What I feel is the complete reductionism INTO numbers. No wonder if 'they' protect us against other types.
Your 'vanilla story' did not ring a bell in my mind to an understganding about what you wrote. I learned that the square root of 2 is irrational, but did not learn what 2 may be if not two kikcs in the behind or two roses. Square rooting goes well within your 'manipuklating numbers' what I believed similarly to "Noah survived the flood". I call 'happiness of the mathematicians' the happiness of the believers not questioning what "number" may be and using them from pre-platonia on. I feel (not in numbers<G>) that your mind is working in the numbers-maze so deeply that I doubt if your help copuld really induce me (from the unbiased outside) into the platonistic-Godelian number crunching wisdom. Thanks anyway for your friendly trying John --- Bruno Marchal <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > Le 21-juil.-06, � 22:52, John M a �crit : > > > Could we talk 'topics' without going into > trivialities what every child > > knows after the first visit to the grocery store? > > > But the cute thing (in my perhaps naive lobianity) > here is that you > don't need more than the trivialities every child > knows after the first > visit to the grocery store, to understand that, once > we assume comp, > Numbers protects the free mind against a *vast* > class of reductionism. > I should perhaps not insist on that because, > sometimes I ask myself, > humanity could be not mature enough, but there are > many reason to > believe that eventually all universal machines > sufficiently correct to > survive will converge toward a state of being > universal dissident, a > typical allergy to authoritative arguments. > > > As long as we cannot identify what a 'number' is, > it does not > > contribute to > > an understanding of reason. > > Could we identify what a human is? > > > What is '3' without monitoring something? > > With the Fi I tried to explain how far can numbers > can monitors > numbers, including partially themselves. > Also, I would get the feeling of lying to myself if > I was not > acknowledging that I understand better the number 3 > than an electron or > a theory about electrons. > > > (This is not a personal attack on you or YOUR > >theory, it is a common belief > > and I question its usability - not by opposing, > just curious to find a way > > to accept it and experience the happiness of the > mathematicians). > > > Do you know the proof that the square root of 2 is > irrational. It is an > impossibility theorem. Godel's incompletness and > Turing's > insolubilities are very deep impossibility theorem > concerning machine, > and us (assuming comp). The happiness of the > mathematician is of many > type: barock, romantic, jazz, mystery-inspired, > esthetic .... > > > As you can see, I have no idea about number > theory. Whenever I tried > > to read > > into it, I found myself (the text) inside the > >mindset which I wanted to > > approach from the outside. Nobody offered so far a > >way to "get in" if you are "outside" of it > > > I can offer my help, but I don't want to insist. > > > It is a magic and I do not like magic. > > I like true magic. I hate magic+ marmelade. > > > > Next time when I ask "how can you describe the > taste of vanilla by > > manipulating ordinary numbers"? TRY IT. > > You asked me more difficult problems in the past, > John. > *assuming comp*, there is an easy answer. Go to > Numberplatonia, use > Goedel's technic to write a little program with the > instruction "help > yourself". Pray each day your little program develop > itself convenably, > perhaps with the help of the heaven. When > sufficiently developed, > maybe after billions of years, invite e to the next > grocery and buy er > a vanilla candy, and then ask er. E will give you > the best description > you can ever hope of a taste of vanilla, > corresponding to a billion > years of ordinary number manipulations and you can > look at them if you > have print the execution of the program. > > If comp is true, nobody will know for sure which > numbers are > responsible for the vanilla qualia, although > empirical theories will > progress up to the point of buying "qualia". > Successes there will be > serendipitous, and unproved scientifically, but most > of us will not > care ... only for bugs ... and protection of privacy > (an explosively > daunting task of the future which will be made > tractable through > quantum information practice I think). > > Bruno > > http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ > --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
