> On 27 Feb 2020, at 21:01, Philip Thrift <cloudver...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > > On Thursday, February 27, 2020 at 6:11:49 AM UTC-6, Bruno Marchal wrote: > > > On 26 Feb 2020, at 21:36, 'Brent Meeker' via Everything List > > <everyth...@googlegroups.com <javascript:>> wrote: > > > > > > > > On 2/26/2020 2:48 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: > >>> Being sure of that sentence is true, "Dr Watson was a friend of > >>> Sherlock Holmes." doesn't mean the things named in the sentence exist. > >> > >> It certainly means that Watson and Homes exist, in some sense. The > >> question is “is that sense interesting with respect to our goal of > >> explaining "everything” (matter and consciousness) in a coherent way? > > > > They exist in exactly the same way arithmetic and Turing machines exist. > > > Really? > > The difference is that arithmetic is used by all physicists, mathematicians, > economists, and that if you are mistaken about their relations, your rocket > might blow up, or miss the moon. > > But if you are wrong about Watson or Holmes, you might just get a bad note at > your English literature course. > > Bruno > > > > What could be a "wrong" thesis about Watson and/or Holmes?
Good question. It would be like making a summary of a novel, which would be wrong. If you say “Tintin never got to the moon” you are wrong, with respect to the novel, and false, with respect to the mundane reality. But if you say that the number 18 is prime, you are false, even among the aliens. Bruno > > (Think of a young Derrida writing a school paper.) > > @philipthrift > > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Everything List" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com > <mailto:everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com>. > To view this discussion on the web visit > https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/23b30502-5d5d-4230-ae21-44cf0e00776f%40googlegroups.com > > <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/23b30502-5d5d-4230-ae21-44cf0e00776f%40googlegroups.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer>. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/F94C9742-2887-4F02-AE74-E3AB0D48A1BB%40ulb.ac.be.
