Hey all,
Nice to see some activity on this list again.
I think the filament's blown, but then again I'm a physicist :-)
Matt.
Norman Samish wrote:
Perhaps you've heard of Thompson's Lamp. This is an ideal lamp, capable of
infinite switching speed and using electricity that
The lamp is a translated version of the Achilles - Turtle race.
My (non-physicist) tupence to the topic:
Reality is a tricky concept. WE know the part of it that is interpreted by
the mind for our limited appreciation. Tis is OUR reality and we know
'that' - only that. It constitutes the (common
It's also possible that the question, although seemingly made up of
ordinary English language words used in a logical way, is actually
incoherent.
If I say, proposition P is both true and false, that is a sentence made
up of English words, but it does not really make sense. I could then
demand
If, without in any way disturbing a system,
we can predict with certainty the value of
a physical quantity, there exists an element
of reality corresponding to this physical
quantity, wrote once EPR.
(Of course the strong term here is *predict*,
because prediction is based on something,
a theory,
Dear Hal,
No, it is not the case that such questions have no meaning. The Liar
paradox, in its many forms and instantiations, convey a meaning. The
problem, IMHO, is in the assumption that the negation is instantaneous.
For example, when we read the sentence This sentence is false, we take it
Perhaps you've heard of Thompson's Lamp. This is an IDEAL lamp, capable of
INFINITE switching SPEED and using electricity that travels at INFINITE SPEED.
Is it pedantic of me to point out that this is an IDEAL lamp, i.e. one which only
exists as an idea, and one which, because of its
On Sat, Oct 25, 2003 at 03:15:57PM -0700, Brent Meeker wrote:
I don't know why anyone thought the speed of light had anything to do
Maybe you should read up on general relativity.
with this problem. The lamp can be at a single point and so can its
A geometrical point has zero length and
Like I said, in mathematics, there MAY be an answer, depending what
mathematical theory
you choose. Even within mathematics, there may be questions that don't
have an answer, and
are ill-formed, and only seem well-formed because they seem to read ok
in informal English.
Without your extra
Scerir writes:
If, without in any way disturbing a system,
we can predict with certainty the value of
a physical quantity, there exists an element
of reality corresponding to this physical
quantity, wrote once EPR.
[...]
Is there a similar definition, in math?
If, from a set of axioms and
Too many messages.
I cannot read them all.
Is there a user group where these things are more organized? Hope so, else I'll
have to block these messages.
Stephen Paul King wrote:
Dear Hal,
No, it is not the case that such questions have no meaning. The Liar
paradox, in its many forms
Too many messages.
I cannot read them all.
Is there a user group where these things are more organized? Hope so, else I'll
have to block these messages.
This mailing list is archived at http://www.escribe.com/science/theory/,
as well as
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