Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[gⅼеɳ ☣]

Ha!  Yeah, the conference I went to a few months ago was _ripe_ (no, not rife, 
RIPE) with this stuff ... mostly in the context of automatic cars.  I really 
appreciated one attendee trashing the Trolley Problem as so ideal as to be 
useless.  I heard an interview with the creator of Wolverine the other morning 
... something about him being one of the first anti-heroes to really make it.  
Good stories always have evil protagonists, like the Godfather.  Narcos is a 
good series.  But they demonize the leaders too much, I think ... just like our 
lefties demonize the banksters a little too much.

On 09/22/2017 09:14 AM, Marcus Daniels wrote:
> In one universe there's brain damage, in another universe the old lady 
> doesn't know anything happened.   Little did you know that the old lady is 
> charge of a human trafficking operation and you `should' have just pointed 
> right at her. Hmm, maybe I'm not helping here?   :-)

-- 
☣ gⅼеɳ


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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Marcus Daniels]

Glen writes:

"Which course corrections can I make that still lead to a satisficing objective 
(like crashing my bike without brain damage), which lead to failure (brain 
damage), which lead to optimal outcome (dodging the left-turning old lady 
completely), etc."

In one universe there's brain damage, in another universe the old lady doesn't 
know anything happened.   Little did you know that the old lady is charge of a 
human trafficking operation and you `should' have just pointed right at her.
 Hmm, maybe I'm not helping here?   :-)

Marcus

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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[gⅼеɳ ☣]

My answer to Roger's question is "both", FWIW.  But my concern seems slightly 
different from both Marcus' and Nick's answers.  I'm more concerned with the 
granularity of the updates/iota.  Nick's 70/30-clean/scramble is pretty fscking 
coarse.  As I said early on, my beliefs/skepticism is *never* that coarse.  
Marcus' set of equivalent solutions gets closer to what I care about... a kind 
of measure of how many options one has at any given *instant* in the action 
process.  And I also care about the boundary of that set.  Which course 
corrections can I make that still lead to a satisficing objective (like 
crashing my bike without brain damage), which lead to failure (brain damage), 
which lead to optimal outcome (dodging the left-turning old lady completely), 
etc.

I maintain that some of this complicated problem solving is conscious and some 
is subconscious (muscle memory as well as the lizard brain).  And I tend to 
believe that the spectrum between the two is fine-grained.  I.e. there is no 
disjoint, binary, distinction between "things I do with full belief" versus 
"things I (don't) do with full skepticism."


On 09/22/2017 08:26 AM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> So I leap across the chasm believing that I have a 70 percent chance of 
> making the jump but knowing that I have a 30 percent chance of not making it. 
>  I think James would argue that to the extent that one paid attention to the 
> 30 percent, it is actually increased.  I.E., if you jump ambivalently, you 
> are less likely to make the jump.  And that would be because an ambivalent 
> jump is functionally different from a confident one.  For instance, to the 
> extent that you prepare yourself to grab at the cliff as you miss,  you 
> ill-prepare yourself to make the jump cleanly.  


On 09/22/2017 08:31 AM, Marcus Daniels wrote:
> Underlying such a network is some generating process, and the belief is about 
> that ongoing process, as tabulated by joint and conditional probabilities.  
> Some of the imagined degrees of freedom may not be relevant in an applied 
> setting (e.g. pilot waves or a multiverse)  and are acceptable reasons for 
> having probabilities, but others can and should be explained by hidden or 
> external variables.   The more these variables are made explicit, the more 
> precise and falsifiable the predictions can be.   Ideally, one would have a 
> network of logical predicates that deterministically lead to one or a 
> degenerate set of equivalent solutions.  


-- 
☣ gⅼеɳ


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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Marcus Daniels]

Glen writes:

< I'd be interested to hear how you (and others) answer Roger's question:  "So 
when the actor believes in a probabilistic network of possible futures, updates 
those expectations according to each iota of evidence as it is received, and 
acts accordingly, is that belief or skepticism?" >

Underlying such a network is some generating process, and the belief is about 
that ongoing process, as tabulated by joint and conditional probabilities.  
Some of the imagined degrees of freedom may not be relevant in an applied 
setting (e.g. pilot waves or a multiverse)  and are acceptable reasons for 
having probabilities, but others can and should be explained by hidden or 
external variables.   The more these variables are made explicit, the more 
precise and falsifiable the predictions can be.   Ideally, one would have a 
network of logical predicates that deterministically lead to one or a 
degenerate set of equivalent solutions.  

Marcus


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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Nick Thompson]

Yes, I agree.  That IS the interesting question.  Thanks for putting it so 
succinctly. 

So I leap across the chasm believing that I have a 70 percent chance of making 
the jump but knowing that I have a 30 percent chance of not making it.  I think 
James would argue that to the extent that one paid attention to the 30 percent, 
it is actually increased.  I.E., if you jump ambivalently, you are less likely 
to make the jump.  And that would be because an ambivalent jump is functionally 
different from a confident one.  For instance, to the extent that you prepare 
yourself to grab at the cliff as you miss,  you ill-prepare yourself to make 
the jump cleanly.  


Nick  



Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/


-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of ?glen?
Sent: Friday, September 22, 2017 10:56 AM
To: FriAM <friam@redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

On 09/22/2017 07:20 AM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> All right.  I admit it.  I know ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about logic.

And that's not true, either. 8^)  You know more about logic than an 
overwhelming majority of people.  The trick is you're convinced of the 
unitarity and hegemony of some particular type of logic.  Lots of people feel 
that way, including many metamathematicians.  But lots of people also disagree. 
 C'est la vie?

> I was TRYING to write a tautology.  So I guess I should have written, "X is 
> Y; therefore, X is Y.  Is THAT a tautology.   I know you have tried to 
> explain this to me before.

Yes.  But I don't think this is a fruitful path for the conversation.  The 
fruitful path was seized upon by Eric, Marcus, and Roger.  I'd be interested to 
hear how you (and others) answer Roger's question:  "So when the actor believes 
in a probabilistic network of possible futures, updates those expectations 
according to each iota of evidence as it is received, and acts accordingly, is 
that belief or skepticism?"


--
␦glen?


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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[┣glen┫]

On 09/22/2017 07:20 AM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> All right.  I admit it.  I know ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about logic.

And that's not true, either. 8^)  You know more about logic than an 
overwhelming majority of people.  The trick is you're convinced of the 
unitarity and hegemony of some particular type of logic.  Lots of people feel 
that way, including many metamathematicians.  But lots of people also disagree. 
 C'est la vie?

> I was TRYING to write a tautology.  So I guess I should have written, "X is 
> Y; therefore, X is Y.  Is THAT a tautology.   I know you have tried to 
> explain this to me before.

Yes.  But I don't think this is a fruitful path for the conversation.  The 
fruitful path was seized upon by Eric, Marcus, and Roger.  I'd be interested to 
hear how you (and others) answer Roger's question:  "So when the actor believes 
in a probabilistic network of possible futures, updates those expectations 
according to each iota of evidence as it is received, and acts accordingly, is 
that belief or skepticism?"


-- 
␦glen?


FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Frank Wimberly]

You should read my erstwhile boss's book.  It goes beyond tennis players:

https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/minds-arrows


Frank Wimberly
Phone (505) 670-9918

On Sep 22, 2017 7:51 AM, "Roger Critchlow" <r...@elf.org> wrote:

> Simulation, hmm.  As I read a cover article in Nature several years ago, a
> study of tennis players established that their nervous systems implemented
> a Bayesian model of where the tennis ball was going in order to prepare for
> the possible return actions that might be necessary.  This reminds me of
> the mythical martial artist who is quietly waiting for the adversary to
> commit to one branch of the ensemble of possible attacks.  So when the
> actor believes in a probabilistic network of possible futures, updates
> those expectations according to each iota of evidence as it is received,
> and acts accordingly, is that belief or skepticism?
>
> -- rec --
>
>
> On Fri, Sep 22, 2017 at 9:32 AM, Marcus Daniels <mar...@snoutfarm.com>
> wrote:
>
>> Eric writes:
>>
>>
>> "But at least one of the reasons to have a mind is to simulate many more
>> actions than one can take.  I guess I would say that concepts like belief
>> refer to very materially instantiated patterns in those contexts of
>> simulation.  But again, that is a topic that has been raised and jousted
>> over in hundreds of FRIAM pages by now, so I am not adding anything new to
>> it here."
>>
>>
>> More than fifteen years ago, one of my colleagues roped me into teaching
>> a complexity summer school where we were tasked to teach agent based
>> modelling.   Absolutely dreading this task, I instead wrote a quick
>> simulation of such jousting -- the projection of personality down to a
>> lower dimensional space.   At that time, the tradition was a 2-d
>> representation with time iteration, not a 1-d with time iteration.I
>> think a model of this forum should at least have two dimensions, as the
>> jousters will often be on oblique angles and miss one another,
>> intentionally or not.   In any case, this was _my_ idea and don't steal it!
>>   I will dig up the Java code to prove it!
>>
>>
>> Marcus
>> ----------
>> *From:* Friam <friam-boun...@redfish.com> on behalf of Eric Smith <
>> desm...@santafe.edu>
>> *Sent:* Friday, September 22, 2017 4:14:01 AM
>> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
>> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia
>>
>> Thanks Nick,
>>
>> Yes, I understand the distinctions below.  I am glad I opened with “Some
>> how I imagine that…”, giving me enough wiggle room to have been wrong in
>> the imagination to almost any degree.  Small larding below, because I too
>> have been under the gun to do something I don’t want to do, but there will
>> be hell to pay for my stalling now.
>>
>> > As a behaviorist, I have to concede that it is possible to act
>> tentatively.  When I am meeting a dog for the first time, I extend the back
>> of my hand into the danger zone near its muzzle, rather than putting out my
>> hand confidently and stroking its neck, head, or flank.  This allows the
>> dog a chance to smell my hand and me a chance to gauge its intentions.  Am
>> I acting in doubt.  I guess it depends on what the proposition is.  If the
>> proposition is that I am safe to reach out and pet the dog, I definitely
>> doubt that.  If the proposition is that no dog is safe to touch on the
>> first meeting, then my tentative behavior affirms that belief.
>> >
>> > Peirce defined belief as that upon which we act and doubt as the
>> absence of belief.  It follows logically that anything we act on affirms
>> some belief and, therefore, at the moment of action, extinguishes all
>> contrary beliefs.  If you follow me here, I may appear to win the argument,
>> but only on sophistic points.
>>
>> I think I understand the alliance between the position you represent as
>> Peirce’s, and behaviorism.  With a lot of effort to stay in the discipline,
>> and not slip back into reflecting my own intuitions, I could perhaps even
>> mimic the kinds of arguments that this alliance makes.
>>
>> As you probably already know, I am comfortable enough working with even
>> sometimes vaguely-understood terms that this position bothers me as
>> bleaching language.  If there were never a value-difference between what
>> one was (or could have been) seen to do, and what was afterwards
>> characterized as one’s beliefs at the time, then it is questionable whether
>> there is any reason to have two word

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Nick Thompson]

All right.  I admit it.  I know ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about logic.  

Frank, can you help me out here?  My concession here was that in Peirce's 
world, the relation of belief to action is analytical  i.e. arises directly 
from the definitions of terms.  I thought this was a big concession, because 
propositions that arise analystically aren't very interesting, and I was 
confessing to having said something not very interesting.  Unfortunately, this 
crowd does not want me to get a way EVEN with that concession.  

I was TRYING to write a tautology.  So I guess I should have written, "X is Y; 
therefore, X is Y.  Is THAT a tautology.   I know you have tried to explain 
this to me before. 

I have CLEARLY gotten myself WAY in over my head, here. 

Thanks, 

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/


-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of ?glen?
Sent: Friday, September 22, 2017 6:17 AM
To: friam@redfish.com
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia


On 09/21/2017 08:27 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> */[NST==> Is there any logic in which, “Let X be Y; therefore X is Y” 
> is not entailed.  If a belief is defined as that upon which one is 
> prepared to act, is there any logic in which acting does not imply 
> belief?  <==nst] /*

Of course.  E.g. modal logics allow different types of "therefore", say ⊨_a and 
⊨_b.  Then it might be true that "Let X be Y  ⊨_a  X is Y" but false that "Let 
X be Y  ⊨_b  X is Y".  Similarly, I can imagine a logic where "be" and "is" 
mean different things.

> On 09/21/2017 05:00 PM, gⅼеɳ ☣ wrote:
> Yes, of course.  E.g. Since most of my actions involve very tight feedback 
> loops, something like tossing a ball to a friend can be launched and then I 
> can make attempts to abort it if, say, I notice the friend has looked away.
> 
> */[NST==>Wouldn’t the best way to analyze this be as a series of 
> “micro” beliefs?  <==nst] /*

What is a "micro" belief?  The whole point of my response was that you are 
over-simplifying both belief and action in order to tell a "just so story" and 
force the story to fit your philosophy.  It seems reasonable to me that if 
actions are decomposable, then so would be beliefs because there's no 
difference between beliefs and actions.

But you are saying something different.  Somehow, to you, beliefs are different 
from actions.


> */[NST==>I think a body can enact conflicting beliefs at the same 
> time, but that is because I am comfortable with the idea that that the 
> same body can simultaneously act on two different belief systems.  CF 
> Freud, slips of the tongue, hysteria, etc.  Frank will correct me. /*

You're implying that, although bodies are composite, belief systems are 
unitary.  If the same body can do 2 conflicting things, why can't the same 
belief system be composed of 2 conflicting things?  This is why I raised the 
idea of paraconsistent, defeasible, and higher order logics.  Specifically 
_those_ types.

Why do you treat belief systems as fundamentally different from physical 
systems?

--
␦glen?


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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Roger Critchlow]

Simulation, hmm.  As I read a cover article in Nature several years ago, a
study of tennis players established that their nervous systems implemented
a Bayesian model of where the tennis ball was going in order to prepare for
the possible return actions that might be necessary.  This reminds me of
the mythical martial artist who is quietly waiting for the adversary to
commit to one branch of the ensemble of possible attacks.  So when the
actor believes in a probabilistic network of possible futures, updates
those expectations according to each iota of evidence as it is received,
and acts accordingly, is that belief or skepticism?

-- rec --


On Fri, Sep 22, 2017 at 9:32 AM, Marcus Daniels <mar...@snoutfarm.com>
wrote:

> Eric writes:
>
>
> "But at least one of the reasons to have a mind is to simulate many more
> actions than one can take.  I guess I would say that concepts like belief
> refer to very materially instantiated patterns in those contexts of
> simulation.  But again, that is a topic that has been raised and jousted
> over in hundreds of FRIAM pages by now, so I am not adding anything new to
> it here."
>
>
> More than fifteen years ago, one of my colleagues roped me into teaching a
> complexity summer school where we were tasked to teach agent based
> modelling.   Absolutely dreading this task, I instead wrote a quick
> simulation of such jousting -- the projection of personality down to a
> lower dimensional space.   At that time, the tradition was a 2-d
> representation with time iteration, not a 1-d with time iteration.I
> think a model of this forum should at least have two dimensions, as the
> jousters will often be on oblique angles and miss one another,
> intentionally or not.   In any case, this was _my_ idea and don't steal it!
>   I will dig up the Java code to prove it!
>
>
> Marcus
> --
> *From:* Friam <friam-boun...@redfish.com> on behalf of Eric Smith <
> desm...@santafe.edu>
> *Sent:* Friday, September 22, 2017 4:14:01 AM
> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia
>
> Thanks Nick,
>
> Yes, I understand the distinctions below.  I am glad I opened with “Some
> how I imagine that…”, giving me enough wiggle room to have been wrong in
> the imagination to almost any degree.  Small larding below, because I too
> have been under the gun to do something I don’t want to do, but there will
> be hell to pay for my stalling now.
>
> > As a behaviorist, I have to concede that it is possible to act
> tentatively.  When I am meeting a dog for the first time, I extend the back
> of my hand into the danger zone near its muzzle, rather than putting out my
> hand confidently and stroking its neck, head, or flank.  This allows the
> dog a chance to smell my hand and me a chance to gauge its intentions.  Am
> I acting in doubt.  I guess it depends on what the proposition is.  If the
> proposition is that I am safe to reach out and pet the dog, I definitely
> doubt that.  If the proposition is that no dog is safe to touch on the
> first meeting, then my tentative behavior affirms that belief.
> >
> > Peirce defined belief as that upon which we act and doubt as the absence
> of belief.  It follows logically that anything we act on affirms some
> belief and, therefore, at the moment of action, extinguishes all contrary
> beliefs.  If you follow me here, I may appear to win the argument, but only
> on sophistic points.
>
> I think I understand the alliance between the position you represent as
> Peirce’s, and behaviorism.  With a lot of effort to stay in the discipline,
> and not slip back into reflecting my own intuitions, I could perhaps even
> mimic the kinds of arguments that this alliance makes.
>
> As you probably already know, I am comfortable enough working with even
> sometimes vaguely-understood terms that this position bothers me as
> bleaching language.  If there were never a value-difference between what
> one was (or could have been) seen to do, and what was afterwards
> characterized as one’s beliefs at the time, then it is questionable whether
> there is any reason to have two words in the language.  I imagine (again)
> that the adamant behaviorists would like to see the word “belief” expunged,
> though perhaps there is room in their lexicon to have to words that always
> take (as a matter of logic, or of construction) the same values, but which
> are allowed to carry different names because they are interfaces of those
> selfsame values to contexts or environments of different kinds.  To me it
> seems more plausible that mental-state terms such as “belief” exist in the
> informal lexicon, as distinct from taken-action, not only be

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Marcus Daniels]

Eric writes:


"But at least one of the reasons to have a mind is to simulate many more 
actions than one can take.  I guess I would say that concepts like belief refer 
to very materially instantiated patterns in those contexts of simulation.  But 
again, that is a topic that has been raised and jousted over in hundreds of 
FRIAM pages by now, so I am not adding anything new to it here."


More than fifteen years ago, one of my colleagues roped me into teaching a 
complexity summer school where we were tasked to teach agent based modelling.   
Absolutely dreading this task, I instead wrote a quick simulation of such 
jousting -- the projection of personality down to a lower dimensional space.   
At that time, the tradition was a 2-d representation with time iteration, not a 
1-d with time iteration.I think a model of this forum should at least have 
two dimensions, as the jousters will often be on oblique angles and miss one 
another, intentionally or not.   In any case, this was _my_ idea and don't 
steal it!   I will dig up the Java code to prove it!


Marcus


From: Friam <friam-boun...@redfish.com> on behalf of Eric Smith 
<desm...@santafe.edu>
Sent: Friday, September 22, 2017 4:14:01 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

Thanks Nick,

Yes, I understand the distinctions below.  I am glad I opened with “Some how I 
imagine that…”, giving me enough wiggle room to have been wrong in the 
imagination to almost any degree.  Small larding below, because I too have been 
under the gun to do something I don’t want to do, but there will be hell to pay 
for my stalling now.

> As a behaviorist, I have to concede that it is possible to act tentatively.  
> When I am meeting a dog for the first time, I extend the back of my hand into 
> the danger zone near its muzzle, rather than putting out my hand confidently 
> and stroking its neck, head, or flank.  This allows the dog a chance to smell 
> my hand and me a chance to gauge its intentions.  Am I acting in doubt.  I 
> guess it depends on what the proposition is.  If the proposition is that I am 
> safe to reach out and pet the dog, I definitely doubt that.  If the 
> proposition is that no dog is safe to touch on the first meeting, then my 
> tentative behavior affirms that belief.
>
> Peirce defined belief as that upon which we act and doubt as the absence of 
> belief.  It follows logically that anything we act on affirms some belief 
> and, therefore, at the moment of action, extinguishes all contrary beliefs.  
> If you follow me here, I may appear to win the argument, but only on 
> sophistic points.

I think I understand the alliance between the position you represent as 
Peirce’s, and behaviorism.  With a lot of effort to stay in the discipline, and 
not slip back into reflecting my own intuitions, I could perhaps even mimic the 
kinds of arguments that this alliance makes.

As you probably already know, I am comfortable enough working with even 
sometimes vaguely-understood terms that this position bothers me as bleaching 
language.  If there were never a value-difference between what one was (or 
could have been) seen to do, and what was afterwards characterized as one’s 
beliefs at the time, then it is questionable whether there is any reason to 
have two words in the language.  I imagine (again) that the adamant 
behaviorists would like to see the word “belief” expunged, though perhaps there 
is room in their lexicon to have to words that always take (as a matter of 
logic, or of construction) the same values, but which are allowed to carry 
different names because they are interfaces of those selfsame values to 
contexts or environments of different kinds.  To me it seems more plausible 
that mental-state terms such as “belief” exist in the informal lexicon, as 
distinct from taken-action, not only because whatever our inner life is makes 
it appealing for us to use such terms, but also because there is an empirical, 
inter-subjectively available structure in tentativeness that the notion of 
beliefs as something with an independent existence from realized actions does a 
good job capturing.  So not only are we inclined to use the word, but nature 
and discourse reinforce us to some extent in doing so.  But at the same time as 
you probably know this is my preferred assumption, I read you as having 
energetically argued that it is invalid, against any number of opponents, so we 
let that stand.

> Allow me to go for a KO.

but that requires so little….

> When you are interacting with humans, how exactly DO you decide what they 
> believe?

If this were the only frame for such a question, would it not say that there is 
no referent for Ontology apart from a mirror of Epistemology?  The important 
thing here being the extreme corner into which it tries to push the argu

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[┣glen┫]

On 09/21/2017 08:27 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> */[NST==> Is there any logic in which, “Let X be Y; therefore X is Y” is not 
> entailed.  If a belief is defined as that upon which one is prepared to act, 
> is there any logic in which acting does not imply belief?  <==nst] /*

Of course.  E.g. modal logics allow different types of "therefore", say ⊨_a and 
⊨_b.  Then it might be true that "Let X be Y  ⊨_a  X is Y" but false that "Let 
X be Y  ⊨_b  X is Y".  Similarly, I can imagine a logic where "be" and "is" 
mean different things.

> On 09/21/2017 05:00 PM, gⅼеɳ ☣ wrote:
> Yes, of course.  E.g. Since most of my actions involve very tight feedback 
> loops, something like tossing a ball to a friend can be launched and then I 
> can make attempts to abort it if, say, I notice the friend has looked away.
> 
> */[NST==>Wouldn’t the best way to analyze this be as a series of “micro” 
> beliefs?  <==nst] /*

What is a "micro" belief?  The whole point of my response was that you are 
over-simplifying both belief and action in order to tell a "just so story" and 
force the story to fit your philosophy.  It seems reasonable to me that if 
actions are decomposable, then so would be beliefs because there's no 
difference between beliefs and actions.

But you are saying something different.  Somehow, to you, beliefs are different 
from actions.


> */[NST==>I think a body can enact conflicting beliefs at the same time, but 
> that is because I am comfortable with the idea that that the same body can 
> simultaneously act on two different belief systems.  CF Freud, slips of the 
> tongue, hysteria, etc.  Frank will correct me. /*

You're implying that, although bodies are composite, belief systems are 
unitary.  If the same body can do 2 conflicting things, why can't the same 
belief system be composed of 2 conflicting things?  This is why I raised the 
idea of paraconsistent, defeasible, and higher order logics.  Specifically 
_those_ types.

Why do you treat belief systems as fundamentally different from physical 
systems?

-- 
␦glen?


FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Eric Smith]

> Would that be rational on your part, or just evidence of your Christian good 
> nature?  Or your belief in a non-material mind?  

Not non-material.  But at least one of the reasons to have a mind is to 
simulate many more actions than one can take.  I guess I would say that 
concepts like belief refer to very materially instantiated patterns in those 
contexts of simulation.  But again, that is a topic that has been raised and 
jousted over in hundreds of FRIAM pages by now, so I am not adding anything new 
to it here.

Moriturus te saluto,

Eric


> 
> All the best, 
> 
> Nick 
> 
> Nicholas S. Thompson
> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
> Clark University
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
> 
> 
> -Original Message-
> From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Eric Smith
> Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 4:44 PM
> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <friam@redfish.com>
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia
> 
> Somehow I imagine that Nick means to say there are costly signals in this 
> game — that motor action is thicker than conversation or reflection.
> 
> If I am walking across a snowfield that I know to be filled with crevasses, 
> and I know I can’t tell which snow holds weight and which doesn’t, my 
> movement is really different than it is putting my feet on the floor beside 
> the bed in the morning.
> 
> To take a different example that is counterfactual but easier to use in 
> invoking the real physiological paralysis, if Thank God Ledge on halfdome 
> were not actually a solid ledge, but a fragile bridge, or if there had been a 
> rockfall that left part of it missing and I were blindfolded, or if I were a 
> prisoner of pirates blindfolded and made to walk the plank, my steps would 
> land differently than they do when I get out of bed in the morning.
> 
> There I didn’t say what anyone else would do in any circumstance, but did 
> claim that my own motions have different regimes that are viscerally _very_ 
> distinct.  I’m not sure I can think about whether I would fight for air when 
> being drowned.  It might be atavistic and beyond anything I normally refer to 
> as “thought”.  I certainly have had people claim to me that that is the case.
> 
> Those distinctions may occupy a different plane than the distinction between 
> reasonableness and dogmatism all in the world of conversation and the social 
> exchange.
> 
> But I should not speak for others.  Only for myself as a spectator.
> 
> Eric
> 
> 
> 
> 
>> On Sep 21, 2017, at 4:32 PM, gⅼеɳ ☣ <geprope...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>> No regrets or apology are needed.  And even if we are about to "argue about 
>> words" ... I forget what famous dead white guy said that ... it's still 
>> useful to me.
>> 
>> You say: "if one acts in the assurance that some fact is the case, one 
>> cannot be said to really doubt it"  The answer is clarified by reading 
>> Marcus' post.  If you act with assurance, then you're not open to changing 
>> your mind.  So, you've simply moved the goal posts or passed the buck.
>> 
>> I *never* act with assurance, as far as I can tell.  Every thing I do seems 
>> plagued with doubt.  I can force myself out of this state with some 
>> activities.  Running more than 3 miles does it.  Math sometimes does it.  
>> Beer does it.  Etc.  But for almost every other action, I do doubt it.  So, 
>> I don't think we're having the discussion James and Peirce might have.  I 
>> think we're talking about two different types of people, those with a 
>> tendency to believe their own beliefs and those who tend to disbelieve their 
>> own beliefs.
>> 
>> Maybe it's because people who act with assurance are just smarter than 
>> people like me?  I don't know.  It's important in this modern world, what 
>> with our affirmation bubbles, fake news, and whatnot.  What is it that makes 
>> people prefer to associate with people whose beliefs they share?  What makes 
>> some people prefer the company of people different from them?  Etc.
>> 
>> 
>> On 09/21/2017 01:20 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
>>> I am afraid this discussion is about to dissolve into a quibble about the 
>>> meaning of the words "doubt" and "belief", but let's take it one more 
>>> round.In my use of the words ... and I think Peirce's ... one can 
>>> entertain a doubt without "really" having one.  Knowledge of perception 
>>> tells us that every perceived "fact" is an inference subject to doubt and 
>>> yet, if one acts in the assurance that some

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Carl Tollander]

I live in space, I only work in doubt


On Thu, Sep 21, 2017 at 1:48 PM, Nick Thompson <nickthomp...@earthlink.net>
wrote:

> Dear Glen,
>
>
>
> I don't know why I am so pissed at Feynman right now but this quote:
>
>
>
> *"When you doubt and ask, it gets a little harder to believe. I can live
> with doubt, and uncertainty, and not knowing. I think it's much more
> interesting to live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong.
> I have approximate answers, and possible beliefs, and different degrees of
> certainty about different things. I'm not absolutely sure of anything. And
> there are many things Ι don't know anything about. But Ι don't have to know
> an answer. I don't ... Ι don't feel frightened by not knowing things, by
> being lost in the universe without having any purpose, which is the way it
> really is as far as Ι can tell, possibly. It doesn't frighten me."*
>
>
>
> … is another one of those sentiments that we would immediately recognise
> as absurd if Feynman hadn’t said it.
>
>
>
> Peirce would say, for the most part, we cannot live in doubt.  We cannot
> doubt that the floor is still under our feet when we put our legs out of
> the bed in the morning or that the visual field is whole, even though our
> eyes tell us that there are two gian holes in it.  Every perception is
> doubtable in the sense that Feynman so vaingloriously lays out here, yet
> for the most part we live in a world of inferred expectations which are
> largely confirmed.  Like the other Feynman quote, it is wise only when we
> stipulate what is absurd about it and make something wise and noble of what
> is left.
>
>
>
> Nick
>
>
>
>
>
> Nicholas S. Thompson
>
> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
>
> Clark University
>
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
>
>
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-
> From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of g??? ?
> Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 1:59 PM
> To: FriAM <friam@redfish.com>
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia
>
>
>
> A better Feynman quote that targets this issue is this one, I think from a
> BBC interview:
>
>
>
> "When you doubt and ask, it gets a little harder to believe. I can live
> with doubt, and uncertainty, and not knowing. I think it's much more
> interesting to live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong.
> I have approximate answers, and possible beliefs, and different degrees of
> certainty about different things. I'm not absolutely sure of anything. And
> there are many things Ι don't know anything about. But Ι don't have to know
> an answer. I don't ... Ι don't feel frightened by not knowing things, by
> being lost in the unverse without having any purpose, which is the way it
> really is as far as Ι can tell, possibly. It doesn't frighten me."
>
>
>
> He was talking in the context of religion, but I think it applies to every
> type of "knowledge", including the "thought manipulation" that is
> philosophy.  The point is not that "thought manipulation" can never be
> useful.  But that one can _justifiably_ take the position that philosophy
> should (moral imperative) be done in the _service_ of something else.
>
>
>
> You cited Smullyan in the OP, which is relevant.  Many of Smullyan's
> publications are puzzles, games.  Some of us simply enjoy puzzles. (I
> don't.) But every puzzle is a math problem.  It's up to the puzzle solver
> to settle on why they're solving puzzles.  Are they doing it because it
> FEELS good?  Or are they doing it because either the solutions or the
> exercises facilitate some other objective?  Some puzzle solvers (e.g. video
> gamers) find themselves in a defensive position, trying to justify their
> fetish against the world around them.  The silly rancor many "practical"
> people aim at philosophers can make some of them defensive.  And it's a
> real shame that we shame philosophers for doing it just because they enjoy
> it.
>
>
>
> But it moves from merely shameful to outright dangerous when a philosopher
> can't distinguish their own _why_.  Someone who does it because it's fun
> shouldn't waste any time yapping about how useful it is.  And someone who
> does it because it's useful shouldn't waste any time yapping about how fun
> it is.  Get over it.  Be confident.  Engage your fetish and ignore the
> nay-sayers.
>
>
>
> On 09/21/2017 09:53 AM, Steven A Smith wrote:
>
> > Glen -
>
> >
>
> > I share your use of the term "Science" as in being an activity (roughly)
> defined by "the Scientif

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Nick Thompson]

Glen, 

 

See Larding below? 

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

 

-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of g??? ?
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 8:01 PM
To: FriAM <friam@redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

 

 

 

On 09/21/2017 04:50 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:

> Well, answering in the sophistic manner, because logically speaking, acting 
> tentatively affirms tentativeness.  

 

You seem to forget that there are many types of logic, paraconsistent, 
defeasible, higher order, etc

[NST==> Is there any logic in which, “Let X be Y; therefore X is Y” is not 
entailed.  If a belief is defined as that upon which one is prepared to act, is 
there any logic in which acting does not imply belief?  <==nst] 

> Is it possible (can you give me an example) of a contradictory ACTION.

 

Yes, of course.  E.g. Since most of my actions involve very tight feedback 
loops, something like tossing a ball to a friend can be launched and then I can 
make attempts to abort it if, say, I notice the friend has looked away. 

[NST==>Wouldn’t the best way to analyze this be as a series of “micro” beliefs? 
 <==nst] 

 Since I would claim that all actions are actually temporally extended 
processes rather than quantum events, I would claim that MOST actions involve 
branches and many branches can be reached from other branches.  So, not only 
are they branched, but many of the branches don't "contradict" the other 
branches.

[NST==>I think a body can enact conflicting beliefs at the same time, but that 
is because I am comfortable with the idea that that the same body can 
simultaneously act on two different belief systems.  CF Freud, slips of the 
tongue, hysteria, etc.  Frank will correct me. 

 

Best, Nick <==nst] 

 

--

☣ gⅼеɳ

 



FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv

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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[gⅼеɳ ☣]

On 09/21/2017 04:50 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> Well, answering in the sophistic manner, because logically speaking, acting 
> tentatively affirms tentativeness.  

You seem to forget that there are many types of logic, paraconsistent, 
defeasible, higher order, etc.

> Is it possible (can you give me an example) of a contradictory ACTION.

Yes, of course.  E.g. Since most of my actions involve very tight feedback 
loops, something like tossing a ball to a friend can be launched and then I can 
make attempts to abort it if, say, I notice the friend has looked away.  Since 
I would claim that all actions are actually temporally extended processes 
rather than quantum events, I would claim that MOST actions involve branches 
and many branches can be reached from other branches.  So, not only are they 
branched, but many of the branches don't "contradict" the other branches.

-- 
☣ gⅼеɳ


FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Nick Thompson]

Glen, 

Well, answering in the sophistic manner, because logically speaking, acting 
tentatively affirms tentativeness.  

Let's me think about this for a moment.  If acting and believing are 
inextricable then the following question becomes relevant.  Is it possible (can 
you give me an example) of a contradictory ACTION.  EG, can I both stop to pick 
up the Wheaties that I just dropped on the floor flake (that my wife will kill 
me for leaving there} and NOT stop to pick it up?  Because, if we can have our 
cake and eat it to in the behavior department AND we are Peirceans, the we 
probably can have our cake and eat it too in the belief department. 

Nick 

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/


-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of g??? ?
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 5:29 PM
To: FriAM <friam@redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

If you, as a non-dualist, allow for tentative action, why not allow for 
tentative belief?

On 09/21/2017 02:20 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> Peirce defined belief as that upon which we act and doubt as the absence of 
> belief.  It follows logically that anything we act on affirms some belief 
> and, therefore, at the moment of action, extinguishes all contrary beliefs.  
> If you follow me here, I may appear to win the argument, but only on 
> sophistic points.  

--
☣ gⅼеɳ


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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe 
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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Marcus Daniels]

You should get back to talking to your television!

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Roger Critchlow
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 3:04 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <friam@redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

I believe you all have too much free time.

-- rec --


On Thu, Sep 21, 2017 at 5:01 PM, Marcus Daniels 
<mar...@snoutfarm.com<mailto:mar...@snoutfarm.com>> wrote:
Speaking for myself, I don’t hold A as an assumption.  A is more like a 
function parameterized on relevant conditions that computes an expected value.  
 Alternatively it could also be a predicate, but parameterized on some 
threshold of risk and/or reward.  If snows a little, I just jump in the car and 
go.   If it is wet and cold and snowed a lot, I go look at the pavement, and 
consider the risks of not getting to where I might be expected or try to think 
of ways to mitigate the risk (e.g. chains).  Sometimes I miscalculate or 
misapprehend the risks and rewards, like the time the car was acting up, but I 
felt I needed to get to work to take a large supercomputer reservation.   (I 
kept going and the car broke a tie rod and was ruined!)

And I never just hop out of bed without looking because the dog could be there.

From: Friam 
[mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com<mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com>] On Behalf 
Of Nick Thompson
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 2:46 PM

To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' 
<friam@redfish.com<mailto:friam@redfish.com>>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

Ok.  Self-reflection time.

1.   Ah!  Perhaps we ARE just quibbling about meanings.  To what extent 
does action based on assumption, A, imply that at the moment of acting, one 
holds A as a belief? I seem to be claiming that it does so as a matter of 
logic; perhaps the rest of you think it is an empirical claim.

2.   I have not defended my trotting out Peirce as if he were God, 
particularly given that I have done so in commentary on others trotting out 
Feynman as if HE were God.  I do so because it is easier for me to figure out 
what somebody else thinks than to figure out what I think, and also if feels 
less narcissistic.  But as Glen points out, this benefit is ephemeral because, 
of course, [What I think Peirce thinks] is just [Something that I think] and 
others may wisely doubt that I have Peirce right.

3.   I now know why I am being cranky.  I am supposed to be winterizing the 
Massachusetts house and packing to travel to Santa Fe.  I hate travel, I hate 
winterizing, and I hate packing.  From my actions, I surmise that I have been 
acting in the belief that I will be happier if I start a fight on FRIAM then if 
I put my head down and do the things I am supposed to be doing.  Sober 
reflection suggests that I may be wrong in that belief.  Will this reflection 
result in a change in my beliefs?  Only my actions will tell.

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Marcus Daniels
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 3:54 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group 
<friam@redfish.com<mailto:friam@redfish.com>>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

There is nothing that infuriates me more than trying to solve a problem 
with/for someone is confident in their hypothesis for no reason other than a 
few past experiences.   No we definitely can live with doubt.  For goodness 
sake we have Donald as president.It is a personality disorder when people 
can’t depart from their priors in the face of actual evidence.

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Nick Thompson
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 1:48 PM
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' 
<friam@redfish.com<mailto:friam@redfish.com>>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia


Dear Glen,



I don't know why I am so pissed at Feynman right now but this quote:



"When you doubt and ask, it gets a little harder to believe. I can live with 
doubt, and uncertainty, and not knowing. I think it's much more interesting to 
live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong. I have approximate 
answers, and possible beliefs, and different degrees of certainty about 
different things. I'm not absolutely sure of anything. And there are many 
things Ι don't know anything about. But Ι don't have to know an answer. I don't 
... Ι don't feel frightened by not knowing things, by being lost in the 
universe without having any purpose, which is the way it really is as far as Ι 
can tell, possibly. It doesn't frighten me."



… is another one of those sentiments that we would immediately recognise as 
absurd if Feynman hadn’t said it.



Peirce would say, for th

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Merle Lefkoff]

Thank you, Roger, for reading my mind.

Hurry up and pack, Nick.  I'm sure everyone misses you.

On Thu, Sep 21, 2017 at 3:03 PM, Roger Critchlow <r...@elf.org> wrote:

> I believe you all have too much free time.
>
> -- rec --
>
>
> On Thu, Sep 21, 2017 at 5:01 PM, Marcus Daniels <mar...@snoutfarm.com>
> wrote:
>
>> Speaking for myself, I don’t hold A as an assumption.  A is more like a
>> function parameterized on relevant conditions that computes an expected
>> value.   Alternatively it could also be a predicate, but parameterized on
>> some threshold of risk and/or reward.  If snows a little, I just jump in
>> the car and go.   If it is wet and cold and snowed a lot, I go look at the
>> pavement, and consider the risks of not getting to where I might be
>> expected or try to think of ways to mitigate the risk (e.g. chains).
>> Sometimes I miscalculate or misapprehend the risks and rewards, like the
>> time the car was acting up, but I felt I needed to get to work to take a
>> large supercomputer reservation.   (I kept going and the car broke a tie
>> rod and was ruined!)
>>
>>
>>
>> And I never just hop out of bed without looking because the dog could be
>> there.
>>
>>
>>
>> *From:* Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] *On Behalf Of *Nick
>> Thompson
>> *Sent:* Thursday, September 21, 2017 2:46 PM
>>
>> *To:* 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' <
>> friam@redfish.com>
>> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia
>>
>>
>>
>> Ok.  Self-reflection time.
>>
>> 1.   Ah!  Perhaps we ARE just quibbling about meanings.  To what
>> extent does action based on assumption, A, imply that at the moment of
>> acting, one holds A as a belief? I seem to be claiming that it does so as a
>> matter of logic; perhaps the rest of you think it is an empirical claim.
>>
>> 2.   I have not defended my trotting out Peirce as if he were God,
>> particularly given that I have done so in commentary on others trotting out
>> Feynman as if HE were God.  I do so because it is easier for me to figure
>> out what somebody else thinks than to figure out what I think, and also if
>> feels less narcissistic.  But as Glen points out, this benefit is ephemeral
>> because, of course, [What I think Peirce thinks] is just [Something that I
>> think] and others may wisely doubt that I have Peirce right.
>>
>> 3.   I now know why I am being cranky.  I am supposed to be
>> winterizing the Massachusetts house and packing to travel to Santa Fe.  I
>> hate travel, I hate winterizing, and I hate packing.  From my actions, I
>> surmise that I have been acting in the belief that I will be happier if I
>> start a fight on FRIAM then if I put my head down and do the things I am
>> supposed to be doing.  Sober reflection suggests that I may be wrong in
>> that belief.  Will this reflection result in a change in my beliefs?  Only
>> my actions will tell.
>>
>>
>>
>> Nick
>>
>>
>>
>> Nicholas S. Thompson
>>
>> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
>>
>> Clark University
>>
>> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
>>
>>
>>
>> *From:* Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com
>> <friam-boun...@redfish.com>] *On Behalf Of *Marcus Daniels
>> *Sent:* Thursday, September 21, 2017 3:54 PM
>> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <
>> friam@redfish.com>
>> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia
>>
>>
>>
>> There is nothing that infuriates me more than trying to solve a problem
>> with/for someone is confident in their hypothesis for no reason other than
>> a few past experiences.   No we definitely can live with doubt.  For
>> goodness sake we have Donald as president.It is a personality disorder
>> when people can’t depart from their priors in the face of actual evidence.
>>
>>
>>
>> *From:* Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com
>> <friam-boun...@redfish.com>] *On Behalf Of *Nick Thompson
>> *Sent:* Thursday, September 21, 2017 1:48 PM
>> *To:* 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' <
>> friam@redfish.com>
>> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia
>>
>>
>>
>> Dear Glen,
>>
>>
>>
>> I don't know why I am so pissed at Feynman right now but this quote:
>>
>>
>>
>> *"When you doubt and ask, it gets a little harder to believe. I can live
>> with doubt, an

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[gⅼеɳ ☣]

If you, as a non-dualist, allow for tentative action, why not allow for 
tentative belief?

On 09/21/2017 02:20 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> Peirce defined belief as that upon which we act and doubt as the absence of 
> belief.  It follows logically that anything we act on affirms some belief 
> and, therefore, at the moment of action, extinguishes all contrary beliefs.  
> If you follow me here, I may appear to win the argument, but only on 
> sophistic points.  

-- 
☣ gⅼеɳ


FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Nick Thompson]

If I carry on for another 45 minutes it will be time to cook dinner and I 
cannot either pack or winterize for yet another day. 

 

May God have mercy on my soul. 

 

n

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

 <http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/> 
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Frank Wimberly
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 4:51 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <friam@redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

 

1.  Empirical.

 

2.  Freud is as close to God as early 20th century intellectuals can get.

 

3.  Your rationalized procrastination makes sense to me.

 

:-)

 

Frank

Frank Wimberly
Phone (505) 670-9918

 

On Sep 21, 2017 2:46 PM, "Nick Thompson" <nickthomp...@earthlink.net 
<mailto:nickthomp...@earthlink.net> > wrote:

Ok.  Self-reflection time. 

1.   Ah!  Perhaps we ARE just quibbling about meanings.  To what extent 
does action based on assumption, A, imply that at the moment of acting, one 
holds A as a belief? I seem to be claiming that it does so as a matter of 
logic; perhaps the rest of you think it is an empirical claim.  

2.   I have not defended my trotting out Peirce as if he were God, 
particularly given that I have done so in commentary on others trotting out 
Feynman as if HE were God.  I do so because it is easier for me to figure out 
what somebody else thinks than to figure out what I think, and also if feels 
less narcissistic.  But as Glen points out, this benefit is ephemeral because, 
of course, [What I think Peirce thinks] is just [Something that I think] and 
others may wisely doubt that I have Peirce right. 

3.   I now know why I am being cranky.  I am supposed to be winterizing the 
Massachusetts house and packing to travel to Santa Fe.  I hate travel, I hate 
winterizing, and I hate packing.  From my actions, I surmise that I have been 
acting in the belief that I will be happier if I start a fight on FRIAM then if 
I put my head down and do the things I am supposed to be doing.  Sober 
reflection suggests that I may be wrong in that belief.  Will this reflection 
result in a change in my beliefs?  Only my actions will tell. 

 

Nick 

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

 <http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/> 
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com 
<mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com> ] On Behalf Of Marcus Daniels
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 3:54 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <friam@redfish.com 
<mailto:friam@redfish.com> >
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

 

There is nothing that infuriates me more than trying to solve a problem 
with/for someone is confident in their hypothesis for no reason other than a 
few past experiences.   No we definitely can live with doubt.  For goodness 
sake we have Donald as president.It is a personality disorder when people 
can’t depart from their priors in the face of actual evidence.

 

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Nick Thompson
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 1:48 PM
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' <friam@redfish.com 
<mailto:friam@redfish.com> >
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

 

Dear Glen,  

 

I don't know why I am so pissed at Feynman right now but this quote:

 

"When you doubt and ask, it gets a little harder to believe. I can live with 
doubt, and uncertainty, and not knowing. I think it's much more interesting to 
live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong. I have approximate 
answers, and possible beliefs, and different degrees of certainty about 
different things. I'm not absolutely sure of anything. And there are many 
things Ι don't know anything about. But Ι don't have to know an answer. I don't 
... Ι don't feel frightened by not knowing things, by being lost in the 
universe without having any purpose, which is the way it really is as far as Ι 
can tell, possibly. It doesn't frighten me."

 

… is another one of those sentiments that we would immediately recognise as 
absurd if Feynman hadn’t said it.  

 

Peirce would say, for the most part, we cannot live in doubt.  We cannot doubt 
that the floor is still under our feet when we put our legs out of the bed in 
the morning or that the visual field is whole, even though our eyes tell us 
that there are two gian holes in it.  Every perception is doubtable in the 
sense that Feynman so vaingloriously lays out here, yet for the most part we 
live in a world of inferred expectations which are largely confirmed.  Like the 
other Feynman quote, it is wise only when we stipulate what 

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Nick Thompson]

Thanks, Eric.  Great as always to hear from you. 

One of the surest ways to avoid packing and winterizing a house is to make a 
dumb statement and then spend the next week defending it on a list-serv. I am 
not quite sure I am in that territory, yet, but I am entertaining doubts. 

As a behaviorist, I have to concede that it is possible to act tentatively.  
When I am meeting a dog for the first time, I extend the back of my hand into 
the danger zone near its muzzle, rather than putting out my hand confidently 
and stroking its neck, head, or flank.  This allows the dog a chance to smell 
my hand and me a chance to gauge its intentions.  Am I acting in doubt.  I 
guess it depends on what the proposition is.  If the proposition is that I am 
safe to reach out and pet the dog, I definitely doubt that.  If the proposition 
is that no dog is safe to touch on the first meeting, then my tentative 
behavior affirms that belief.  

Peirce defined belief as that upon which we act and doubt as the absence of 
belief.  It follows logically that anything we act on affirms some belief and, 
therefore, at the moment of action, extinguishes all contrary beliefs.  If you 
follow me here, I may appear to win the argument, but only on sophistic points. 
 

Allow me to go for a KO.  When you are interacting with humans, how exactly DO 
you decide what they believe?  What are the practices you would engage in to 
test the belief of somebody.  Can you imagine a test of some belief that would 
allow you to infer that I believe something even though my actions are 
inconsistent with that belief?  Would that be rational on your part, or just 
evidence of your Christian good nature?  Or your belief in a non-material mind? 
 

All the best, 

Nick 

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/


-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Eric Smith
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 4:44 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <friam@redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

Somehow I imagine that Nick means to say there are costly signals in this game 
— that motor action is thicker than conversation or reflection.

If I am walking across a snowfield that I know to be filled with crevasses, and 
I know I can’t tell which snow holds weight and which doesn’t, my movement is 
really different than it is putting my feet on the floor beside the bed in the 
morning.

To take a different example that is counterfactual but easier to use in 
invoking the real physiological paralysis, if Thank God Ledge on halfdome were 
not actually a solid ledge, but a fragile bridge, or if there had been a 
rockfall that left part of it missing and I were blindfolded, or if I were a 
prisoner of pirates blindfolded and made to walk the plank, my steps would land 
differently than they do when I get out of bed in the morning.

There I didn’t say what anyone else would do in any circumstance, but did claim 
that my own motions have different regimes that are viscerally _very_ distinct. 
 I’m not sure I can think about whether I would fight for air when being 
drowned.  It might be atavistic and beyond anything I normally refer to as 
“thought”.  I certainly have had people claim to me that that is the case.

Those distinctions may occupy a different plane than the distinction between 
reasonableness and dogmatism all in the world of conversation and the social 
exchange.

But I should not speak for others.  Only for myself as a spectator.

Eric




> On Sep 21, 2017, at 4:32 PM, gⅼеɳ ☣ <geprope...@gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> No regrets or apology are needed.  And even if we are about to "argue about 
> words" ... I forget what famous dead white guy said that ... it's still 
> useful to me.
> 
> You say: "if one acts in the assurance that some fact is the case, one cannot 
> be said to really doubt it"  The answer is clarified by reading Marcus' post. 
>  If you act with assurance, then you're not open to changing your mind.  So, 
> you've simply moved the goal posts or passed the buck.
> 
> I *never* act with assurance, as far as I can tell.  Every thing I do seems 
> plagued with doubt.  I can force myself out of this state with some 
> activities.  Running more than 3 miles does it.  Math sometimes does it.  
> Beer does it.  Etc.  But for almost every other action, I do doubt it.  So, I 
> don't think we're having the discussion James and Peirce might have.  I think 
> we're talking about two different types of people, those with a tendency to 
> believe their own beliefs and those who tend to disbelieve their own beliefs.
> 
> Maybe it's because people who act with assurance are just smarter than people 
> like me?  I don't know.  It's important in this modern world, what with our 
>

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Roger Critchlow]

I believe you all have too much free time.

-- rec --


On Thu, Sep 21, 2017 at 5:01 PM, Marcus Daniels <mar...@snoutfarm.com>
wrote:

> Speaking for myself, I don’t hold A as an assumption.  A is more like a
> function parameterized on relevant conditions that computes an expected
> value.   Alternatively it could also be a predicate, but parameterized on
> some threshold of risk and/or reward.  If snows a little, I just jump in
> the car and go.   If it is wet and cold and snowed a lot, I go look at the
> pavement, and consider the risks of not getting to where I might be
> expected or try to think of ways to mitigate the risk (e.g. chains).
> Sometimes I miscalculate or misapprehend the risks and rewards, like the
> time the car was acting up, but I felt I needed to get to work to take a
> large supercomputer reservation.   (I kept going and the car broke a tie
> rod and was ruined!)
>
>
>
> And I never just hop out of bed without looking because the dog could be
> there.
>
>
>
> *From:* Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] *On Behalf Of *Nick
> Thompson
> *Sent:* Thursday, September 21, 2017 2:46 PM
>
> *To:* 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' <
> friam@redfish.com>
> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia
>
>
>
> Ok.  Self-reflection time.
>
> 1.   Ah!  Perhaps we ARE just quibbling about meanings.  To what
> extent does action based on assumption, A, imply that at the moment of
> acting, one holds A as a belief? I seem to be claiming that it does so as a
> matter of logic; perhaps the rest of you think it is an empirical claim.
>
> 2.   I have not defended my trotting out Peirce as if he were God,
> particularly given that I have done so in commentary on others trotting out
> Feynman as if HE were God.  I do so because it is easier for me to figure
> out what somebody else thinks than to figure out what I think, and also if
> feels less narcissistic.  But as Glen points out, this benefit is ephemeral
> because, of course, [What I think Peirce thinks] is just [Something that I
> think] and others may wisely doubt that I have Peirce right.
>
> 3.   I now know why I am being cranky.  I am supposed to be
> winterizing the Massachusetts house and packing to travel to Santa Fe.  I
> hate travel, I hate winterizing, and I hate packing.  From my actions, I
> surmise that I have been acting in the belief that I will be happier if I
> start a fight on FRIAM then if I put my head down and do the things I am
> supposed to be doing.  Sober reflection suggests that I may be wrong in
> that belief.  Will this reflection result in a change in my beliefs?  Only
> my actions will tell.
>
>
>
> Nick
>
>
>
> Nicholas S. Thompson
>
> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
>
> Clark University
>
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
>
>
>
> *From:* Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com
> <friam-boun...@redfish.com>] *On Behalf Of *Marcus Daniels
> *Sent:* Thursday, September 21, 2017 3:54 PM
> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <
> friam@redfish.com>
> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia
>
>
>
> There is nothing that infuriates me more than trying to solve a problem
> with/for someone is confident in their hypothesis for no reason other than
> a few past experiences.   No we definitely can live with doubt.  For
> goodness sake we have Donald as president.It is a personality disorder
> when people can’t depart from their priors in the face of actual evidence.
>
>
>
> *From:* Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com
> <friam-boun...@redfish.com>] *On Behalf Of *Nick Thompson
> *Sent:* Thursday, September 21, 2017 1:48 PM
> *To:* 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' <
> friam@redfish.com>
> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia
>
>
>
> Dear Glen,
>
>
>
> I don't know why I am so pissed at Feynman right now but this quote:
>
>
>
> *"When you doubt and ask, it gets a little harder to believe. I can live
> with doubt, and uncertainty, and not knowing. I think it's much more
> interesting to live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong.
> I have approximate answers, and possible beliefs, and different degrees of
> certainty about different things. I'm not absolutely sure of anything. And
> there are many things Ι don't know anything about. But Ι don't have to know
> an answer. I don't ... Ι don't feel frightened by not knowing things, by
> being lost in the universe without having any purpose, which is the way it
> really is as far as Ι can tell, possibly. It doesn't frighten me."*
>
>
>

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Marcus Daniels]

Speaking for myself, I don’t hold A as an assumption.  A is more like a 
function parameterized on relevant conditions that computes an expected value.  
 Alternatively it could also be a predicate, but parameterized on some 
threshold of risk and/or reward.  If snows a little, I just jump in the car and 
go.   If it is wet and cold and snowed a lot, I go look at the pavement, and 
consider the risks of not getting to where I might be expected or try to think 
of ways to mitigate the risk (e.g. chains).  Sometimes I miscalculate or 
misapprehend the risks and rewards, like the time the car was acting up, but I 
felt I needed to get to work to take a large supercomputer reservation.   (I 
kept going and the car broke a tie rod and was ruined!)

And I never just hop out of bed without looking because the dog could be there.

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Nick Thompson
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 2:46 PM
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' <friam@redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

Ok.  Self-reflection time.

1.   Ah!  Perhaps we ARE just quibbling about meanings.  To what extent 
does action based on assumption, A, imply that at the moment of acting, one 
holds A as a belief? I seem to be claiming that it does so as a matter of 
logic; perhaps the rest of you think it is an empirical claim.

2.   I have not defended my trotting out Peirce as if he were God, 
particularly given that I have done so in commentary on others trotting out 
Feynman as if HE were God.  I do so because it is easier for me to figure out 
what somebody else thinks than to figure out what I think, and also if feels 
less narcissistic.  But as Glen points out, this benefit is ephemeral because, 
of course, [What I think Peirce thinks] is just [Something that I think] and 
others may wisely doubt that I have Peirce right.

3.   I now know why I am being cranky.  I am supposed to be winterizing the 
Massachusetts house and packing to travel to Santa Fe.  I hate travel, I hate 
winterizing, and I hate packing.  From my actions, I surmise that I have been 
acting in the belief that I will be happier if I start a fight on FRIAM then if 
I put my head down and do the things I am supposed to be doing.  Sober 
reflection suggests that I may be wrong in that belief.  Will this reflection 
result in a change in my beliefs?  Only my actions will tell.

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Marcus Daniels
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 3:54 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group 
<friam@redfish.com<mailto:friam@redfish.com>>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

There is nothing that infuriates me more than trying to solve a problem 
with/for someone is confident in their hypothesis for no reason other than a 
few past experiences.   No we definitely can live with doubt.  For goodness 
sake we have Donald as president.It is a personality disorder when people 
can’t depart from their priors in the face of actual evidence.

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Nick Thompson
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 1:48 PM
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' 
<friam@redfish.com<mailto:friam@redfish.com>>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia


Dear Glen,



I don't know why I am so pissed at Feynman right now but this quote:



"When you doubt and ask, it gets a little harder to believe. I can live with 
doubt, and uncertainty, and not knowing. I think it's much more interesting to 
live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong. I have approximate 
answers, and possible beliefs, and different degrees of certainty about 
different things. I'm not absolutely sure of anything. And there are many 
things Ι don't know anything about. But Ι don't have to know an answer. I don't 
... Ι don't feel frightened by not knowing things, by being lost in the 
universe without having any purpose, which is the way it really is as far as Ι 
can tell, possibly. It doesn't frighten me."



… is another one of those sentiments that we would immediately recognise as 
absurd if Feynman hadn’t said it.



Peirce would say, for the most part, we cannot live in doubt.  We cannot doubt 
that the floor is still under our feet when we put our legs out of the bed in 
the morning or that the visual field is whole, even though our eyes tell us 
that there are two gian holes in it.  Every perception is doubtable in the 
sense that Feynman so vaingloriously lays out here, yet for the most part we 
live in a world of inferred expectations which are largely confirmed.  Like the 
other Feynman quote, it is wise only when we stipulate what is absurd about it 
and make something wise and noble 

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[gⅼеɳ ☣]

Excellent digestion!  I'll fully admit that my body has a kind of momentum.  
The running example is perfect.  For the 1st mile (for certain), every breath 
and every step seems equivalently doubted, ungainly, awkward.  As I literally 
force myself into the 2nd mile, I suspect my body changes.  I begin thinking 
about other things.  Some automatic part of me has begun to take control.  By 
the 4th mile, I am completely automatic.

That automation seems to be a forcing structure.  In contrast, when I'm doing 
calisthenics, I never achieve such automation.  At any given position or 
movement, any one of my multifarious weaknesses might cause me to fail.  My 
lower or upper back kinks or spasms, the cartiledge in my wrist will crumple, 
my epicondyl will sprain, etc.  I can get into a kind of "flow" or groove when 
doing it, so that my self dissolves or I begin thinking about other things.  
But here, unlike running, as soon as I begin thinking about my body again, that 
momentum evaporates and I, again, doubt every movement.

So, there are some types of activity that have more "convinced" regimes than 
other types of activity.  In my 4th mile of running, I am like Nick, convinced 
of some "belief", with no doubt.  But I never achieve that state in 
calisthenics.



On 09/21/2017 01:44 PM, Eric Smith wrote:
> Somehow I imagine that Nick means to say there are costly signals in this 
> game — that motor action is thicker than conversation or reflection.
> 
> If I am walking across a snowfield that I know to be filled with crevasses, 
> and I know I can’t tell which snow holds weight and which doesn’t, my 
> movement is really different than it is putting my feet on the floor beside 
> the bed in the morning.
> 
> To take a different example that is counterfactual but easier to use in 
> invoking the real physiological paralysis, if Thank God Ledge on halfdome 
> were not actually a solid ledge, but a fragile bridge, or if there had been a 
> rockfall that left part of it missing and I were blindfolded, or if I were a 
> prisoner of pirates blindfolded and made to walk the plank, my steps would 
> land differently than they do when I get out of bed in the morning.
> 
> There I didn’t say what anyone else would do in any circumstance, but did 
> claim that my own motions have different regimes that are viscerally _very_ 
> distinct.  I’m not sure I can think about whether I would fight for air when 
> being drowned.  It might be atavistic and beyond anything I normally refer to 
> as “thought”.  I certainly have had people claim to me that that is the case.
> 
> Those distinctions may occupy a different plane than the distinction between 
> reasonableness and dogmatism all in the world of conversation and the social 
> exchange.
> 
> But I should not speak for others.  Only for myself as a spectator.


-- 
☣ gⅼеɳ


FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Frank Wimberly]

1.  Empirical.

2.  Freud is as close to God as early 20th century intellectuals can get.

3.  Your rationalized procrastination makes sense to me.

:-)

Frank

Frank Wimberly
Phone (505) 670-9918

On Sep 21, 2017 2:46 PM, "Nick Thompson" <nickthomp...@earthlink.net> wrote:

> Ok.  Self-reflection time.
>
> 1.   Ah!  Perhaps we ARE just quibbling about meanings.  To what
> extent does action based on assumption, A, imply that at the moment of
> acting, one holds A as a belief? I seem to be claiming that it does so as a
> matter of logic; perhaps the rest of you think it is an empirical claim.
>
> 2.   I have not defended my trotting out Peirce as if he were God,
> particularly given that I have done so in commentary on others trotting out
> Feynman as if HE were God.  I do so because it is easier for me to figure
> out what somebody else thinks than to figure out what I think, and also if
> feels less narcissistic.  But as Glen points out, this benefit is ephemeral
> because, of course, [What I think Peirce thinks] is just [Something that I
> think] and others may wisely doubt that I have Peirce right.
>
> 3.   I now know why I am being cranky.  I am supposed to be
> winterizing the Massachusetts house and packing to travel to Santa Fe.  I
> hate travel, I hate winterizing, and I hate packing.  From my actions, I
> surmise that I have been acting in the belief that I will be happier if I
> start a fight on FRIAM then if I put my head down and do the things I am
> supposed to be doing.  Sober reflection suggests that I may be wrong in
> that belief.  Will this reflection result in a change in my beliefs?  Only
> my actions will tell.
>
>
>
> Nick
>
>
>
> Nicholas S. Thompson
>
> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
>
> Clark University
>
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
>
>
>
> *From:* Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] *On Behalf Of *Marcus
> Daniels
> *Sent:* Thursday, September 21, 2017 3:54 PM
> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <
> friam@redfish.com>
> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia
>
>
>
> There is nothing that infuriates me more than trying to solve a problem
> with/for someone is confident in their hypothesis for no reason other than
> a few past experiences.   No we definitely can live with doubt.  For
> goodness sake we have Donald as president.It is a personality disorder
> when people can’t depart from their priors in the face of actual evidence.
>
>
>
> *From:* Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com
> <friam-boun...@redfish.com>] *On Behalf Of *Nick Thompson
> *Sent:* Thursday, September 21, 2017 1:48 PM
> *To:* 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' <
> friam@redfish.com>
> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia
>
>
>
> Dear Glen,
>
>
>
> I don't know why I am so pissed at Feynman right now but this quote:
>
>
>
> *"When you doubt and ask, it gets a little harder to believe. I can live
> with doubt, and uncertainty, and not knowing. I think it's much more
> interesting to live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong.
> I have approximate answers, and possible beliefs, and different degrees of
> certainty about different things. I'm not absolutely sure of anything. And
> there are many things Ι don't know anything about. But Ι don't have to know
> an answer. I don't ... Ι don't feel frightened by not knowing things, by
> being lost in the universe without having any purpose, which is the way it
> really is as far as Ι can tell, possibly. It doesn't frighten me."*
>
>
>
> … is another one of those sentiments that we would immediately recognise
> as absurd if Feynman hadn’t said it.
>
>
>
> Peirce would say, for the most part, we cannot live in doubt.  We cannot
> doubt that the floor is still under our feet when we put our legs out of
> the bed in the morning or that the visual field is whole, even though our
> eyes tell us that there are two gian holes in it.  Every perception is
> doubtable in the sense that Feynman so vaingloriously lays out here, yet
> for the most part we live in a world of inferred expectations which are
> largely confirmed.  Like the other Feynman quote, it is wise only when we
> stipulate what is absurd about it and make something wise and noble of what
> is left.
>
>
>
> Nick
>
>
>
>
>
> Nicholas S. Thompson
>
> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
>
> Clark University
>
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
>
>
>
>
>
> -Original Message-
> From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com <f

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Nick Thompson]

Ok.  Self-reflection time. 

1.   Ah!  Perhaps we ARE just quibbling about meanings.  To what extent 
does action based on assumption, A, imply that at the moment of acting, one 
holds A as a belief? I seem to be claiming that it does so as a matter of 
logic; perhaps the rest of you think it is an empirical claim.  

2.   I have not defended my trotting out Peirce as if he were God, 
particularly given that I have done so in commentary on others trotting out 
Feynman as if HE were God.  I do so because it is easier for me to figure out 
what somebody else thinks than to figure out what I think, and also if feels 
less narcissistic.  But as Glen points out, this benefit is ephemeral because, 
of course, [What I think Peirce thinks] is just [Something that I think] and 
others may wisely doubt that I have Peirce right. 

3.   I now know why I am being cranky.  I am supposed to be winterizing the 
Massachusetts house and packing to travel to Santa Fe.  I hate travel, I hate 
winterizing, and I hate packing.  From my actions, I surmise that I have been 
acting in the belief that I will be happier if I start a fight on FRIAM then if 
I put my head down and do the things I am supposed to be doing.  Sober 
reflection suggests that I may be wrong in that belief.  Will this reflection 
result in a change in my beliefs?  Only my actions will tell. 

 

Nick 

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

 <http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/> 
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Marcus Daniels
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 3:54 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <friam@redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

 

There is nothing that infuriates me more than trying to solve a problem 
with/for someone is confident in their hypothesis for no reason other than a 
few past experiences.   No we definitely can live with doubt.  For goodness 
sake we have Donald as president.It is a personality disorder when people 
can’t depart from their priors in the face of actual evidence.

 

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Nick Thompson
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 1:48 PM
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' <friam@redfish.com 
<mailto:friam@redfish.com> >
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

 

Dear Glen,  

 

I don't know why I am so pissed at Feynman right now but this quote:

 

"When you doubt and ask, it gets a little harder to believe. I can live with 
doubt, and uncertainty, and not knowing. I think it's much more interesting to 
live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong. I have approximate 
answers, and possible beliefs, and different degrees of certainty about 
different things. I'm not absolutely sure of anything. And there are many 
things Ι don't know anything about. But Ι don't have to know an answer. I don't 
... Ι don't feel frightened by not knowing things, by being lost in the 
universe without having any purpose, which is the way it really is as far as Ι 
can tell, possibly. It doesn't frighten me."

 

… is another one of those sentiments that we would immediately recognise as 
absurd if Feynman hadn’t said it.  

 

Peirce would say, for the most part, we cannot live in doubt.  We cannot doubt 
that the floor is still under our feet when we put our legs out of the bed in 
the morning or that the visual field is whole, even though our eyes tell us 
that there are two gian holes in it.  Every perception is doubtable in the 
sense that Feynman so vaingloriously lays out here, yet for the most part we 
live in a world of inferred expectations which are largely confirmed.  Like the 
other Feynman quote, it is wise only when we stipulate what is absurd about it 
and make something wise and noble of what is left. 

 

Nick 

 

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

 

-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of g??? ?
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 1:59 PM
To: FriAM <friam@redfish.com <mailto:friam@redfish.com> >
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

 

A better Feynman quote that targets this issue is this one, I think from a BBC 
interview:

 

"When you doubt and ask, it gets a little harder to believe. I can live with 
doubt, and uncertainty, and not knowing. I think it's much more interesting to 
live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong. I have approximate 
answers, and possible beliefs, and different degrees of certainty about 
different things. I'm not absolutely sure of anything. And there are many 
things Ι don't know anything about. But Ι don't have to know an answer. I don't

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Eric Smith]

Somehow I imagine that Nick means to say there are costly signals in this game 
— that motor action is thicker than conversation or reflection.

If I am walking across a snowfield that I know to be filled with crevasses, and 
I know I can’t tell which snow holds weight and which doesn’t, my movement is 
really different than it is putting my feet on the floor beside the bed in the 
morning.

To take a different example that is counterfactual but easier to use in 
invoking the real physiological paralysis, if Thank God Ledge on halfdome were 
not actually a solid ledge, but a fragile bridge, or if there had been a 
rockfall that left part of it missing and I were blindfolded, or if I were a 
prisoner of pirates blindfolded and made to walk the plank, my steps would land 
differently than they do when I get out of bed in the morning.

There I didn’t say what anyone else would do in any circumstance, but did claim 
that my own motions have different regimes that are viscerally _very_ distinct. 
 I’m not sure I can think about whether I would fight for air when being 
drowned.  It might be atavistic and beyond anything I normally refer to as 
“thought”.  I certainly have had people claim to me that that is the case.

Those distinctions may occupy a different plane than the distinction between 
reasonableness and dogmatism all in the world of conversation and the social 
exchange.

But I should not speak for others.  Only for myself as a spectator.

Eric




> On Sep 21, 2017, at 4:32 PM, gⅼеɳ ☣  wrote:
> 
> No regrets or apology are needed.  And even if we are about to "argue about 
> words" ... I forget what famous dead white guy said that ... it's still 
> useful to me.
> 
> You say: "if one acts in the assurance that some fact is the case, one cannot 
> be said to really doubt it"  The answer is clarified by reading Marcus' post. 
>  If you act with assurance, then you're not open to changing your mind.  So, 
> you've simply moved the goal posts or passed the buck.
> 
> I *never* act with assurance, as far as I can tell.  Every thing I do seems 
> plagued with doubt.  I can force myself out of this state with some 
> activities.  Running more than 3 miles does it.  Math sometimes does it.  
> Beer does it.  Etc.  But for almost every other action, I do doubt it.  So, I 
> don't think we're having the discussion James and Peirce might have.  I think 
> we're talking about two different types of people, those with a tendency to 
> believe their own beliefs and those who tend to disbelieve their own beliefs.
> 
> Maybe it's because people who act with assurance are just smarter than people 
> like me?  I don't know.  It's important in this modern world, what with our 
> affirmation bubbles, fake news, and whatnot.  What is it that makes people 
> prefer to associate with people whose beliefs they share?  What makes some 
> people prefer the company of people different from them?  Etc.
> 
> 
> On 09/21/2017 01:20 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
>> I am afraid this discussion is about to dissolve into a quibble about the 
>> meaning of the words "doubt" and "belief", but let's take it one more round. 
>>In my use of the words ... and I think Peirce's ... one can entertain a 
>> doubt without "really" having one.  Knowledge of perception tells us that 
>> every perceived "fact" is an inference subject to doubt and yet, if one acts 
>> in the assurance that some fact is the case, one cannot be said to really 
>> doubt it, can one?   It follows, then, that to the extent that we act on our 
>> perceptions, we act without doubt on expectations that are doubtable.  
>> 
>> Eric Charles may be able to help me with this:  there is some debate between 
>> William  James and Peirce about whether the man, being chased by the bear 
>> who pauses at the edge of the chasm, and then leaps across it, doubted at 
>> the moment of leaping that he could make the jump.  I think James says Yes 
>> and Peirce says No.  If that is the argument we are having, then I am 
>> satisfied we have wrung everything we can out of it.  
>> 
>> Anyway.  I regret being cranky, but I can't seem to stop.  Is that another 
>> example of what we are talking about here?  
> 
> -- 
> ☣ gⅼеɳ
> 
> 
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove



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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Marcus Daniels]

Time for an aphorism!

The fundamental cause of the trouble is that in the modern world the stupid are 
cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt. Bertrand Russell  

-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of g??? ?
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 2:32 PM
To: FriAM <friam@redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

No regrets or apology are needed.  And even if we are about to "argue about 
words" ... I forget what famous dead white guy said that ... it's still useful 
to me.

You say: "if one acts in the assurance that some fact is the case, one cannot 
be said to really doubt it"  The answer is clarified by reading Marcus' post.  
If you act with assurance, then you're not open to changing your mind.  So, 
you've simply moved the goal posts or passed the buck.

I *never* act with assurance, as far as I can tell.  Every thing I do seems 
plagued with doubt.  I can force myself out of this state with some activities. 
 Running more than 3 miles does it.  Math sometimes does it.  Beer does it.  
Etc.  But for almost every other action, I do doubt it.  So, I don't think 
we're having the discussion James and Peirce might have.  I think we're talking 
about two different types of people, those with a tendency to believe their own 
beliefs and those who tend to disbelieve their own beliefs.

Maybe it's because people who act with assurance are just smarter than people 
like me?  I don't know.  It's important in this modern world, what with our 
affirmation bubbles, fake news, and whatnot.  What is it that makes people 
prefer to associate with people whose beliefs they share?  What makes some 
people prefer the company of people different from them?  Etc.


On 09/21/2017 01:20 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> I am afraid this discussion is about to dissolve into a quibble about the 
> meaning of the words "doubt" and "belief", but let's take it one more round.  
>   In my use of the words ... and I think Peirce's ... one can entertain a 
> doubt without "really" having one.  Knowledge of perception tells us that 
> every perceived "fact" is an inference subject to doubt and yet, if one acts 
> in the assurance that some fact is the case, one cannot be said to really 
> doubt it, can one?   It follows, then, that to the extent that we act on our 
> perceptions, we act without doubt on expectations that are doubtable.  
> 
> Eric Charles may be able to help me with this:  there is some debate between 
> William  James and Peirce about whether the man, being chased by the bear who 
> pauses at the edge of the chasm, and then leaps across it, doubted at the 
> moment of leaping that he could make the jump.  I think James says Yes and 
> Peirce says No.  If that is the argument we are having, then I am satisfied 
> we have wrung everything we can out of it.  
> 
> Anyway.  I regret being cranky, but I can't seem to stop.  Is that another 
> example of what we are talking about here?  

--
☣ gⅼеɳ


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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe 
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FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[gⅼеɳ ☣]

No regrets or apology are needed.  And even if we are about to "argue about 
words" ... I forget what famous dead white guy said that ... it's still useful 
to me.

You say: "if one acts in the assurance that some fact is the case, one cannot 
be said to really doubt it"  The answer is clarified by reading Marcus' post.  
If you act with assurance, then you're not open to changing your mind.  So, 
you've simply moved the goal posts or passed the buck.

I *never* act with assurance, as far as I can tell.  Every thing I do seems 
plagued with doubt.  I can force myself out of this state with some activities. 
 Running more than 3 miles does it.  Math sometimes does it.  Beer does it.  
Etc.  But for almost every other action, I do doubt it.  So, I don't think 
we're having the discussion James and Peirce might have.  I think we're talking 
about two different types of people, those with a tendency to believe their own 
beliefs and those who tend to disbelieve their own beliefs.

Maybe it's because people who act with assurance are just smarter than people 
like me?  I don't know.  It's important in this modern world, what with our 
affirmation bubbles, fake news, and whatnot.  What is it that makes people 
prefer to associate with people whose beliefs they share?  What makes some 
people prefer the company of people different from them?  Etc.


On 09/21/2017 01:20 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> I am afraid this discussion is about to dissolve into a quibble about the 
> meaning of the words "doubt" and "belief", but let's take it one more round.  
>   In my use of the words ... and I think Peirce's ... one can entertain a 
> doubt without "really" having one.  Knowledge of perception tells us that 
> every perceived "fact" is an inference subject to doubt and yet, if one acts 
> in the assurance that some fact is the case, one cannot be said to really 
> doubt it, can one?   It follows, then, that to the extent that we act on our 
> perceptions, we act without doubt on expectations that are doubtable.  
> 
> Eric Charles may be able to help me with this:  there is some debate between 
> William  James and Peirce about whether the man, being chased by the bear who 
> pauses at the edge of the chasm, and then leaps across it, doubted at the 
> moment of leaping that he could make the jump.  I think James says Yes and 
> Peirce says No.  If that is the argument we are having, then I am satisfied 
> we have wrung everything we can out of it.  
> 
> Anyway.  I regret being cranky, but I can't seem to stop.  Is that another 
> example of what we are talking about here?  

-- 
☣ gⅼеɳ


FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Frank Wimberly]

To me "metaknowledge" denotes knowledge about knowledge.  For example, "I
know 7,486 aphorisms".  That's a false statement.

Frank

Frank Wimberly
Phone (505) 670-9918

On Sep 21, 2017 2:25 PM, "Nick Thompson" <nickthomp...@earthlink.net> wrote:

> Hmm!
>
> I meant "meta knowledge" as knowledge of how to go about something gleaned
> from watching others succeed and fail at it.  Is that the same thing?
>
> n
>
>
>
> Nicholas S. Thompson
> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
> Clark University
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
>
>
> -Original Message-
> From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Marcus Daniels
> Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 3:39 PM
> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <friam@redfish.com>
> Cc: 'Mike Bybee' <mikeby...@earthlink.net>
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia
>
> To clarify, I meant `meta-knowledge' in the sense of "Do I know what I
> know?" or "Do I know I don't know?"  as opposed to the idea of drawing
> conclusions by studying other studies.  Can one label their questions or
> propositions as vague or not vague..
>
> -Original Message-
> From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Nick Thompson
> Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 1:32 PM
> To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' <
> friam@redfish.com>
> Cc: 'Mike Bybee' <mikeby...@earthlink.net>
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia
>
> Glen,
>
> This baffled me as much as it interested me.  In the end, I wasn't sure
> whose side you were on.  My problem may be that, being a Peircean,
> philosophy is for me just an extension of the scientific method and
> philosophical knowledge is just "meta-knowledge" gleaned from the same
> sources as scientific knowledge.  Speaking as a sort-of ornithologist, I
> still think the metaphor stinks. It still strikes me as one of those
> unthinking philosophical platitudes trotted out by people without the
> knowledge of experience to think philosophically.  Remember that guy Donald
> Griffin who thought he knew about "mind" because he knew so much about bats
> and insects?
>
> Nick
>
> Nick
>
> Nicholas S. Thompson
> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
>
>
> -Original Message-
> From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of g??? ?
> Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 12:28 PM
> To: FriAM <friam@redfish.com>
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia
>
> It's definitely sage.  But the sagacity doesn't hinge on the word
> "science", it hinges on the word _useful_.  Science is often thought to be
> a body of knowledge.  But there's a huge swath of people, me included, who
> think science is not knowledge, but a method/behavior for formulating and
> testing hypotheses.  It's not clear to me that Feynman actually said this.
> But Feynman is a good candidate because he cared far more about what you
> _do_ than what you claim to _know_.
>
> Philosophy (of anything) can be useful.  But to any working scientist, it
> is far less useful than, say, glass blowing, programming, or cell sorting.
> And if you think distinguishing between the usefulness of beakers from the
> usefulness of ... oh, let's say Popper's 3 worlds, then your expression
> says more about you than it does about them.
>
>
> On 09/20/2017 08:27 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> > By the way, the Feynman quote is really dumb, and it’s annoying that
> people keep trotting it out as if it was sage.  The reason birds can’t make
> use of ornithology is they can’t read. Think how useful it would be for a
> cuckoo host to be able to spend a few hours reading a text on egg
> identification.   Is the reason physicists can’t make use of philosophy of
> science that they can’t think?  I doubt anyone who cites this “aphorism”
> would come to that conclusion.  Bad metaphor.
>
> --
> ☣ gⅼеɳ
>
> 
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe
> http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove
>
>
> 
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe
> http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Stra

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Nick Thompson]

Hmm! 

I meant "meta knowledge" as knowledge of how to go about something gleaned from 
watching others succeed and fail at it.  Is that the same thing? 

n



Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/


-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Marcus Daniels
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 3:39 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <friam@redfish.com>
Cc: 'Mike Bybee' <mikeby...@earthlink.net>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

To clarify, I meant `meta-knowledge' in the sense of "Do I know what I know?" 
or "Do I know I don't know?"  as opposed to the idea of drawing conclusions by 
studying other studies.  Can one label their questions or propositions as vague 
or not vague..  

-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Nick Thompson
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 1:32 PM
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' <friam@redfish.com>
Cc: 'Mike Bybee' <mikeby...@earthlink.net>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

Glen,

This baffled me as much as it interested me.  In the end, I wasn't sure whose 
side you were on.  My problem may be that, being a Peircean, philosophy is for 
me just an extension of the scientific method and philosophical knowledge is 
just "meta-knowledge" gleaned from the same sources as scientific knowledge.  
Speaking as a sort-of ornithologist, I still think the metaphor stinks. It 
still strikes me as one of those unthinking philosophical platitudes trotted 
out by people without the knowledge of experience to think philosophically.  
Remember that guy Donald Griffin who thought he knew about "mind" because he 
knew so much about bats and insects? 

Nick 

Nick 

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University 
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/


-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of g??? ?
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 12:28 PM
To: FriAM <friam@redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

It's definitely sage.  But the sagacity doesn't hinge on the word "science", it 
hinges on the word _useful_.  Science is often thought to be a body of 
knowledge.  But there's a huge swath of people, me included, who think science 
is not knowledge, but a method/behavior for formulating and testing hypotheses. 
 It's not clear to me that Feynman actually said this.  But Feynman is a good 
candidate because he cared far more about what you _do_ than what you claim to 
_know_.

Philosophy (of anything) can be useful.  But to any working scientist, it is 
far less useful than, say, glass blowing, programming, or cell sorting.  And if 
you think distinguishing between the usefulness of beakers from the usefulness 
of ... oh, let's say Popper's 3 worlds, then your expression says more about 
you than it does about them.


On 09/20/2017 08:27 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> By the way, the Feynman quote is really dumb, and it’s annoying that people 
> keep trotting it out as if it was sage.  The reason birds can’t make use of 
> ornithology is they can’t read. Think how useful it would be for a cuckoo 
> host to be able to spend a few hours reading a text on egg identification.   
> Is the reason physicists can’t make use of philosophy of science that they 
> can’t think?  I doubt anyone who cites this “aphorism” would come to that 
> conclusion.  Bad metaphor. 

--
☣ gⅼеɳ


FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe 
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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Nick Thompson]

Glen, 

I apologize.  My rhetorical manners are not in good order.  I am being cranky.  

I am afraid this discussion is about to dissolve into a quibble about the 
meaning of the words "doubt" and "belief", but let's take it one more round.
In my use of the words ... and I think Peirce's ... one can entertain a doubt 
without "really" having one.  Knowledge of perception tells us that every 
perceived "fact" is an inference subject to doubt and yet, if one acts in the 
assurance that some fact is the case, one cannot be said to really doubt it, 
can one?   It follows, then, that to the extent that we act on our perceptions, 
we act without doubt on expectations that are doubtable.  

Eric Charles may be able to help me with this:  there is some debate between 
William  James and Peirce about whether the man, being chased by the bear who 
pauses at the edge of the chasm, and then leaps across it, doubted at the 
moment of leaping that he could make the jump.  I think James says Yes and 
Peirce says No.  If that is the argument we are having, then I am satisfied we 
have wrung everything we can out of it.  

Anyway.  I regret being cranky, but I can't seem to stop.  Is that another 
example of what we are talking about here?  

Nick 

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/


-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of g??? ?
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 3:58 PM
To: FriAM <friam@redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

It's strange.  You speak about the way _you_ think and behave as if that's the 
way _I_ think and behave.  Can we all say "vainglorously" together? 8^)

I can tell you unflinchingly and honestly that I DO doubt that the floor is 
still under my feet when I put my legs out of the bed in the morning.  If you 
don't doubt it, then you are governed by faith and convinced by things you 
believe.   Even IF you know precisely what Peirce WOULD say (which we can 
doubt), it still doesn't mean Peirce was right.  Yeah, it's likely he was way 
smarter than me.  But that doesn't mean he knows what I do and don't doubt.

I doubt nearly everything about myself on a continual basis.  I doubt my 
strength.  I doubt my intelligence.  I doubt every purchase I've ever made.  I 
doubt that Renee' will stay with me.  I doubt everything on a continual basis.  
So, you (or Peirce) are clearly flat-out wrong.  It seems very arrogant to 
stumble along thinking your expectations are somehow important enough to remain 
true.


On 09/21/2017 12:48 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> Peirce would say, for the most part, we cannot live in doubt.  We cannot 
> doubt that the floor is still under our feet when we put our legs out of the 
> bed in the morning or that the visual field is whole, even though our eyes 
> tell us that there are two gian holes in it.  Every perception is doubtable 
> in the sense that Feynman so vaingloriously lays out here, yet for the most 
> part we live in a world of inferred expectations which are largely confirmed. 
>  Like the other Feynman quote, it is wise only when we stipulate what is 
> absurd about it and make something wise and noble of what is left.

--
☣ gⅼеɳ


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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[gⅼеɳ ☣]

It's strange.  You speak about the way _you_ think and behave as if that's the 
way _I_ think and behave.  Can we all say "vainglorously" together? 8^)

I can tell you unflinchingly and honestly that I DO doubt that the floor is 
still under my feet when I put my legs out of the bed in the morning.  If you 
don't doubt it, then you are governed by faith and convinced by things you 
believe.   Even IF you know precisely what Peirce WOULD say (which we can 
doubt), it still doesn't mean Peirce was right.  Yeah, it's likely he was way 
smarter than me.  But that doesn't mean he knows what I do and don't doubt.

I doubt nearly everything about myself on a continual basis.  I doubt my 
strength.  I doubt my intelligence.  I doubt every purchase I've ever made.  I 
doubt that Renee' will stay with me.  I doubt everything on a continual basis.  
So, you (or Peirce) are clearly flat-out wrong.  It seems very arrogant to 
stumble along thinking your expectations are somehow important enough to remain 
true.


On 09/21/2017 12:48 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> Peirce would say, for the most part, we cannot live in doubt.  We cannot 
> doubt that the floor is still under our feet when we put our legs out of the 
> bed in the morning or that the visual field is whole, even though our eyes 
> tell us that there are two gian holes in it.  Every perception is doubtable 
> in the sense that Feynman so vaingloriously lays out here, yet for the most 
> part we live in a world of inferred expectations which are largely confirmed. 
>  Like the other Feynman quote, it is wise only when we stipulate what is 
> absurd about it and make something wise and noble of what is left.

-- 
☣ gⅼеɳ


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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Marcus Daniels]

There is nothing that infuriates me more than trying to solve a problem 
with/for someone is confident in their hypothesis for no reason other than a 
few past experiences.   No we definitely can live with doubt.  For goodness 
sake we have Donald as president.It is a personality disorder when people 
can’t depart from their priors in the face of actual evidence.

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Nick Thompson
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 1:48 PM
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' <friam@redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia


Dear Glen,



I don't know why I am so pissed at Feynman right now but this quote:



"When you doubt and ask, it gets a little harder to believe. I can live with 
doubt, and uncertainty, and not knowing. I think it's much more interesting to 
live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong. I have approximate 
answers, and possible beliefs, and different degrees of certainty about 
different things. I'm not absolutely sure of anything. And there are many 
things Ι don't know anything about. But Ι don't have to know an answer. I don't 
... Ι don't feel frightened by not knowing things, by being lost in the 
universe without having any purpose, which is the way it really is as far as Ι 
can tell, possibly. It doesn't frighten me."



… is another one of those sentiments that we would immediately recognise as 
absurd if Feynman hadn’t said it.



Peirce would say, for the most part, we cannot live in doubt.  We cannot doubt 
that the floor is still under our feet when we put our legs out of the bed in 
the morning or that the visual field is whole, even though our eyes tell us 
that there are two gian holes in it.  Every perception is doubtable in the 
sense that Feynman so vaingloriously lays out here, yet for the most part we 
live in a world of inferred expectations which are largely confirmed.  Like the 
other Feynman quote, it is wise only when we stipulate what is absurd about it 
and make something wise and noble of what is left.



Nick





Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/





-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of g??? ?
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 1:59 PM
To: FriAM <friam@redfish.com<mailto:friam@redfish.com>>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia



A better Feynman quote that targets this issue is this one, I think from a BBC 
interview:



"When you doubt and ask, it gets a little harder to believe. I can live with 
doubt, and uncertainty, and not knowing. I think it's much more interesting to 
live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong. I have approximate 
answers, and possible beliefs, and different degrees of certainty about 
different things. I'm not absolutely sure of anything. And there are many 
things Ι don't know anything about. But Ι don't have to know an answer. I don't 
... Ι don't feel frightened by not knowing things, by being lost in the unverse 
without having any purpose, which is the way it really is as far as Ι can tell, 
possibly. It doesn't frighten me."



He was talking in the context of religion, but I think it applies to every type 
of "knowledge", including the "thought manipulation" that is philosophy.  The 
point is not that "thought manipulation" can never be useful.  But that one can 
_justifiably_ take the position that philosophy should (moral imperative) be 
done in the _service_ of something else.



You cited Smullyan in the OP, which is relevant.  Many of Smullyan's 
publications are puzzles, games.  Some of us simply enjoy puzzles. (I don't.) 
But every puzzle is a math problem.  It's up to the puzzle solver to settle on 
why they're solving puzzles.  Are they doing it because it FEELS good?  Or are 
they doing it because either the solutions or the exercises facilitate some 
other objective?  Some puzzle solvers (e.g. video gamers) find themselves in a 
defensive position, trying to justify their fetish against the world around 
them.  The silly rancor many "practical" people aim at philosophers can make 
some of them defensive.  And it's a real shame that we shame philosophers for 
doing it just because they enjoy it.



But it moves from merely shameful to outright dangerous when a philosopher 
can't distinguish their own _why_.  Someone who does it because it's fun 
shouldn't waste any time yapping about how useful it is.  And someone who does 
it because it's useful shouldn't waste any time yapping about how fun it is.  
Get over it.  Be confident.  Engage your fetish and ignore the nay-sayers.



On 09/21/2017 09:53 AM, Steven A Smith wrote:

> Glen -

>

> I share your use of the term "Science" as in being an activity (roughly) 
> defined by "the

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Nick Thompson]

Dear Glen,  

 

I don't know why I am so pissed at Feynman right now but this quote:

 

"When you doubt and ask, it gets a little harder to believe. I can live with 
doubt, and uncertainty, and not knowing. I think it's much more interesting to 
live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong. I have approximate 
answers, and possible beliefs, and different degrees of certainty about 
different things. I'm not absolutely sure of anything. And there are many 
things Ι don't know anything about. But Ι don't have to know an answer. I don't 
... Ι don't feel frightened by not knowing things, by being lost in the 
universe without having any purpose, which is the way it really is as far as Ι 
can tell, possibly. It doesn't frighten me."

 

… is another one of those sentiments that we would immediately recognise as 
absurd if Feynman hadn’t said it.  

 

Peirce would say, for the most part, we cannot live in doubt.  We cannot doubt 
that the floor is still under our feet when we put our legs out of the bed in 
the morning or that the visual field is whole, even though our eyes tell us 
that there are two gian holes in it.  Every perception is doubtable in the 
sense that Feynman so vaingloriously lays out here, yet for the most part we 
live in a world of inferred expectations which are largely confirmed.  Like the 
other Feynman quote, it is wise only when we stipulate what is absurd about it 
and make something wise and noble of what is left. 

 

Nick 

 

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

 

-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of g??? ?
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 1:59 PM
To: FriAM <friam@redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

 

A better Feynman quote that targets this issue is this one, I think from a BBC 
interview:

 

"When you doubt and ask, it gets a little harder to believe. I can live with 
doubt, and uncertainty, and not knowing. I think it's much more interesting to 
live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong. I have approximate 
answers, and possible beliefs, and different degrees of certainty about 
different things. I'm not absolutely sure of anything. And there are many 
things Ι don't know anything about. But Ι don't have to know an answer. I don't 
... Ι don't feel frightened by not knowing things, by being lost in the unverse 
without having any purpose, which is the way it really is as far as Ι can tell, 
possibly. It doesn't frighten me."

 

He was talking in the context of religion, but I think it applies to every type 
of "knowledge", including the "thought manipulation" that is philosophy.  The 
point is not that "thought manipulation" can never be useful.  But that one can 
_justifiably_ take the position that philosophy should (moral imperative) be 
done in the _service_ of something else.

 

You cited Smullyan in the OP, which is relevant.  Many of Smullyan's 
publications are puzzles, games.  Some of us simply enjoy puzzles. (I don't.) 
But every puzzle is a math problem.  It's up to the puzzle solver to settle on 
why they're solving puzzles.  Are they doing it because it FEELS good?  Or are 
they doing it because either the solutions or the exercises facilitate some 
other objective?  Some puzzle solvers (e.g. video gamers) find themselves in a 
defensive position, trying to justify their fetish against the world around 
them.  The silly rancor many "practical" people aim at philosophers can make 
some of them defensive.  And it's a real shame that we shame philosophers for 
doing it just because they enjoy it.

 

But it moves from merely shameful to outright dangerous when a philosopher 
can't distinguish their own _why_.  Someone who does it because it's fun 
shouldn't waste any time yapping about how useful it is.  And someone who does 
it because it's useful shouldn't waste any time yapping about how fun it is.  
Get over it.  Be confident.  Engage your fetish and ignore the nay-sayers.

 

On 09/21/2017 09:53 AM, Steven A Smith wrote:

> Glen -

> 

> I share your use of the term "Science" as in being an activity (roughly) 
> defined by "the Scientific Method" just as I use the term "Art" as the 
> process rather than the product (aka "Artifact").

> 

> When I do anything vaguely (or presumptively) artistic, I think of my role as 
> that of an "Artifex" more than an "Artist" because I feel more emphasis on 
> the conception/making than on being tuned into or tied into a larger, higher 
> group/power which is how I read "Art and Artist".  I have a similar 
> ambivalence about "Scientist/Science".   Despite degrees in Math and Physics, 
> my practice has rarely involved act

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Marcus Daniels]

To clarify, I meant `meta-knowledge' in the sense of "Do I know what I know?" 
or "Do I know I don't know?"  as opposed to the idea of drawing conclusions by 
studying other studies.  Can one label their questions or propositions as vague 
or not vague..  

-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Nick Thompson
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 1:32 PM
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' <friam@redfish.com>
Cc: 'Mike Bybee' <mikeby...@earthlink.net>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

Glen,

This baffled me as much as it interested me.  In the end, I wasn't sure whose 
side you were on.  My problem may be that, being a Peircean, philosophy is for 
me just an extension of the scientific method and philosophical knowledge is 
just "meta-knowledge" gleaned from the same sources as scientific knowledge.  
Speaking as a sort-of ornithologist, I still think the metaphor stinks. It 
still strikes me as one of those unthinking philosophical platitudes trotted 
out by people without the knowledge of experience to think philosophically.  
Remember that guy Donald Griffin who thought he knew about "mind" because he 
knew so much about bats and insects? 

Nick 

Nick 

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University 
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/


-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of g??? ?
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 12:28 PM
To: FriAM <friam@redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

It's definitely sage.  But the sagacity doesn't hinge on the word "science", it 
hinges on the word _useful_.  Science is often thought to be a body of 
knowledge.  But there's a huge swath of people, me included, who think science 
is not knowledge, but a method/behavior for formulating and testing hypotheses. 
 It's not clear to me that Feynman actually said this.  But Feynman is a good 
candidate because he cared far more about what you _do_ than what you claim to 
_know_.

Philosophy (of anything) can be useful.  But to any working scientist, it is 
far less useful than, say, glass blowing, programming, or cell sorting.  And if 
you think distinguishing between the usefulness of beakers from the usefulness 
of ... oh, let's say Popper's 3 worlds, then your expression says more about 
you than it does about them.


On 09/20/2017 08:27 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> By the way, the Feynman quote is really dumb, and it’s annoying that people 
> keep trotting it out as if it was sage.  The reason birds can’t make use of 
> ornithology is they can’t read. Think how useful it would be for a cuckoo 
> host to be able to spend a few hours reading a text on egg identification.   
> Is the reason physicists can’t make use of philosophy of science that they 
> can’t think?  I doubt anyone who cites this “aphorism” would come to that 
> conclusion.  Bad metaphor. 

--
☣ gⅼеɳ


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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe 
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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Steven A Smith]

OK, you got me..  (as usual).

I suppose I was speaking of how this particular Feynman Quote is 
(mis)used vs how the Dyson quote is (mis)used.   I wasn't responding to 
your elaboration in this case, nor presuming to know what either of them 
actually *meant*.   How is that for weasely?


Thanks for the Otto/Wanda link... not sure of the precise relevance 
(except for audacious banter?)


   Kline:  "Don't Call me Stupid!"

   Curtis:  "To call you stupid is an insult to stupid people!"

   Kline:  "Apes don't read Philosophy!"

   Curtis:  "Yes they do, they just don't understand it!"

Wanda is one of my favorite characters of all time (not Otto, I have 
other favorite Kevin Kline roles) but the scene where he is huffing 
Jamie Lee Curtis' boot is classic!



On 9/21/17 12:33 PM, gⅼеɳ ☣ wrote:

Bah!  Do you actually think Dyson's aphorism is in stark juxtaposition to 
Feynman's?  I thought, by including so much of what Feynman said, it would be 
less likely anyone would read it wrong.  But if you think Feynman was saying 
being vague is better than being wrong, you TOTALLY misunderstood what he was 
saying.

I'm reminded of Otto.  Are we seriously trading aphorisms?  
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YKbYLb5GVc

On 09/21/2017 11:09 AM, Steven A Smith wrote:

in stark juxtaposition, we have Freeman Dyson saying:

 "it is better to be wrong than vague"

I think I know what he meant and generally support not getting frozen in 
inaction or muddying/qualifying a statement to the point of losing meaning.



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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[gⅼеɳ ☣]

Heh, I'm on the side of people who refuse to take aphorisms seriously, no 
matter who coins them, repeats them, etc.  Otto's reading Nietzsche is the 
perfect example.  Attempts to be pithy only appeal to sloppy thinkers.

I admit that inside jokes can be good and comforting, but ONLY when you're sure 
there is an "inside".  If you have any doubt about the in-group status of the 
group you find yourself with, then stay away from aphorisms and try to tell an 
authentic story.

On 09/21/2017 12:31 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> This baffled me as much as it interested me.  In the end, I wasn't sure whose 
> side you were on.  My problem may be that, being a Peircean, philosophy is 
> for me just an extension of the scientific method and philosophical knowledge 
> is just "meta-knowledge" gleaned from the same sources as scientific 
> knowledge.  Speaking as a sort-of ornithologist, I still think the metaphor 
> stinks. It still strikes me as one of those unthinking philosophical 
> platitudes trotted out by people without the knowledge of experience to think 
> philosophically.  Remember that guy Donald Griffin who thought he knew about 
> "mind" because he knew so much about bats and insects? 


-- 
☣ gⅼеɳ


FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Nick Thompson]

Glen,

This baffled me as much as it interested me.  In the end, I wasn't sure whose 
side you were on.  My problem may be that, being a Peircean, philosophy is for 
me just an extension of the scientific method and philosophical knowledge is 
just "meta-knowledge" gleaned from the same sources as scientific knowledge.  
Speaking as a sort-of ornithologist, I still think the metaphor stinks. It 
still strikes me as one of those unthinking philosophical platitudes trotted 
out by people without the knowledge of experience to think philosophically.  
Remember that guy Donald Griffin who thought he knew about "mind" because he 
knew so much about bats and insects? 

Nick 

Nick 

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/


-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of g??? ?
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 12:28 PM
To: FriAM <friam@redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

It's definitely sage.  But the sagacity doesn't hinge on the word "science", it 
hinges on the word _useful_.  Science is often thought to be a body of 
knowledge.  But there's a huge swath of people, me included, who think science 
is not knowledge, but a method/behavior for formulating and testing hypotheses. 
 It's not clear to me that Feynman actually said this.  But Feynman is a good 
candidate because he cared far more about what you _do_ than what you claim to 
_know_.

Philosophy (of anything) can be useful.  But to any working scientist, it is 
far less useful than, say, glass blowing, programming, or cell sorting.  And if 
you think distinguishing between the usefulness of beakers from the usefulness 
of ... oh, let's say Popper's 3 worlds, then your expression says more about 
you than it does about them.


On 09/20/2017 08:27 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> By the way, the Feynman quote is really dumb, and it’s annoying that people 
> keep trotting it out as if it was sage.  The reason birds can’t make use of 
> ornithology is they can’t read. Think how useful it would be for a cuckoo 
> host to be able to spend a few hours reading a text on egg identification.   
> Is the reason physicists can’t make use of philosophy of science that they 
> can’t think?  I doubt anyone who cites this “aphorism” would come to that 
> conclusion.  Bad metaphor. 

--
☣ gⅼеɳ


FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe 
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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[gⅼеɳ ☣]

Bah!  Do you actually think Dyson's aphorism is in stark juxtaposition to 
Feynman's?  I thought, by including so much of what Feynman said, it would be 
less likely anyone would read it wrong.  But if you think Feynman was saying 
being vague is better than being wrong, you TOTALLY misunderstood what he was 
saying.

I'm reminded of Otto.  Are we seriously trading aphorisms?  
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YKbYLb5GVc

On 09/21/2017 11:09 AM, Steven A Smith wrote:
> in stark juxtaposition, we have Freeman Dyson saying:
> 
> "it is better to be wrong than vague"
> 
> I think I know what he meant and generally support not getting frozen in 
> inaction or muddying/qualifying a statement to the point of losing meaning.

-- 
☣ gⅼеɳ


FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Marcus Daniels]

Good have the metaknowledge of vagueness and seek to reduce it.  
Like learning to avoid mistakes..

https://www.wired.com/story/the-education-of-brett-the-robot/

-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Steven A Smith
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 12:09 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <friam@redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

Glen -

in stark juxtaposition, we have Freeman Dyson saying:

     "it is better to be wrong than vague"

I think I know what he meant and generally support not getting frozen in 
inaction or muddying/qualifying a statement to the point of losing meaning.

On the other hand, I find this quote (or at least idea) as an excuse for rash 
over thoughtful action.

- Steve

On 9/21/17 11:58 AM, gⅼеɳ ☣ wrote:
> A better Feynman quote that targets this issue is this one, I think from a 
> BBC interview:
>
> "When you doubt and ask, it gets a little harder to believe. I can live with 
> doubt, and uncertainty, and not knowing. I think it's much more interesting 
> to live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong. I have 
> approximate answers, and possible beliefs, and different degrees of certainty 
> about different things. I'm not absolutely sure of anything. And there are 
> many things Ι don't know anything about. But Ι don't have to know an answer. 
> I don't ... Ι don't feel frightened by not knowing things, by being lost in 
> the unverse without having any purpose, which is the way it really is as far 
> as Ι can tell, possibly. It doesn't frighten me."
>
> He was talking in the context of religion, but I think it applies to every 
> type of "knowledge", including the "thought manipulation" that is philosophy. 
>  The point is not that "thought manipulation" can never be useful.  But that 
> one can _justifiably_ take the position that philosophy should (moral 
> imperative) be done in the _service_ of something else.
>
> You cited Smullyan in the OP, which is relevant.  Many of Smullyan's 
> publications are puzzles, games.  Some of us simply enjoy puzzles. (I don't.) 
> But every puzzle is a math problem.  It's up to the puzzle solver to settle 
> on why they're solving puzzles.  Are they doing it because it FEELS good?  Or 
> are they doing it because either the solutions or the exercises facilitate 
> some other objective?  Some puzzle solvers (e.g. video gamers) find 
> themselves in a defensive position, trying to justify their fetish against 
> the world around them.  The silly rancor many "practical" people aim at 
> philosophers can make some of them defensive.  And it's a real shame that we 
> shame philosophers for doing it just because they enjoy it.
>
> But it moves from merely shameful to outright dangerous when a philosopher 
> can't distinguish their own _why_.  Someone who does it because it's fun 
> shouldn't waste any time yapping about how useful it is.  And someone who 
> does it because it's useful shouldn't waste any time yapping about how fun it 
> is.  Get over it.  Be confident.  Engage your fetish and ignore the 
> nay-sayers.
>
> On 09/21/2017 09:53 AM, Steven A Smith wrote:
>> Glen -
>>
>> I share your use of the term "Science" as in being an activity (roughly) 
>> defined by "the Scientific Method" just as I use the term "Art" as the 
>> process rather than the product (aka "Artifact").
>>
>> When I do anything vaguely (or presumptively) artistic, I think of my role 
>> as that of an "Artifex" more than an "Artist" because I feel more emphasis 
>> on the conception/making than on being tuned into or tied into a larger, 
>> higher group/power which is how I read "Art and Artist".  I have a similar 
>> ambivalence about "Scientist/Science".   Despite degrees in Math and 
>> Physics, my practice has rarely involved actual Science (or more math than 
>> just really fancy arithmetic), though I have worked with "real Scientists" 
>> and close to "Scientific Progress" for most of my life.   I don't even think 
>> of my work as having been that of an Engineer, but truly much closer to 
>> simply that of a "Technologist".   And as everyone who has read my missives 
>> here can attest, my throwdown as a "Philosopher" is equally detuned... but 
>> suspect myself to oscillate wildly between the poles of "Philosopher" and 
>> "Philistine".   All that rattled off, I truly value having enough 
>> understanding of all of these
>> ideals to recognize the differences qualitatively, and to have mildly 
>&g

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Steven A Smith]

Glen -

in stark juxtaposition, we have Freeman Dyson saying:

    "it is better to be wrong than vague"

I think I know what he meant and generally support not getting frozen in 
inaction or muddying/qualifying a statement to the point of losing meaning.


On the other hand, I find this quote (or at least idea) as an excuse for 
rash over thoughtful action.


- Steve

On 9/21/17 11:58 AM, gⅼеɳ ☣ wrote:

A better Feynman quote that targets this issue is this one, I think from a BBC 
interview:

"When you doubt and ask, it gets a little harder to believe. I can live with doubt, 
and uncertainty, and not knowing. I think it's much more interesting to live not knowing 
than to have answers which might be wrong. I have approximate answers, and possible 
beliefs, and different degrees of certainty about different things. I'm not absolutely 
sure of anything. And there are many things Ι don't know anything about. But Ι don't have 
to know an answer. I don't ... Ι don't feel frightened by not knowing things, by being 
lost in the unverse without having any purpose, which is the way it really is as far as Ι 
can tell, possibly. It doesn't frighten me."

He was talking in the context of religion, but I think it applies to every type of "knowledge", 
including the "thought manipulation" that is philosophy.  The point is not that "thought 
manipulation" can never be useful.  But that one can _justifiably_ take the position that philosophy 
should (moral imperative) be done in the _service_ of something else.

You cited Smullyan in the OP, which is relevant.  Many of Smullyan's publications are 
puzzles, games.  Some of us simply enjoy puzzles. (I don't.) But every puzzle is a math 
problem.  It's up to the puzzle solver to settle on why they're solving puzzles.  Are 
they doing it because it FEELS good?  Or are they doing it because either the solutions 
or the exercises facilitate some other objective?  Some puzzle solvers (e.g. video 
gamers) find themselves in a defensive position, trying to justify their fetish against 
the world around them.  The silly rancor many "practical" people aim at 
philosophers can make some of them defensive.  And it's a real shame that we shame 
philosophers for doing it just because they enjoy it.

But it moves from merely shameful to outright dangerous when a philosopher 
can't distinguish their own _why_.  Someone who does it because it's fun 
shouldn't waste any time yapping about how useful it is.  And someone who does 
it because it's useful shouldn't waste any time yapping about how fun it is.  
Get over it.  Be confident.  Engage your fetish and ignore the nay-sayers.

On 09/21/2017 09:53 AM, Steven A Smith wrote:

Glen -

I share your use of the term "Science" as in being an activity (roughly) defined by "the Scientific 
Method" just as I use the term "Art" as the process rather than the product (aka "Artifact").

When I do anything vaguely (or presumptively) artistic, I think of my role as that of an "Artifex" more than an "Artist" because I feel more emphasis on the 
conception/making than on being tuned into or tied into a larger, higher group/power which is how I read "Art and Artist".  I have a similar ambivalence about 
"Scientist/Science".   Despite degrees in Math and Physics, my practice has rarely involved actual Science (or more math than just really fancy arithmetic), though I 
have worked with "real Scientists" and close to "Scientific Progress" for most of my life.   I don't even think of my work as having been that of an Engineer, 
but truly much closer to simply that of a "Technologist".   And as everyone who has read my missives here can attest, my throwdown as a "Philosopher" is 
equally detuned... but suspect myself to oscillate wildly between the poles of "Philosopher" and "Philistine".   All that rattled off, I truly value having 
enough understanding of all of these
ideals to recognize the differences qualitatively, and to have mildly informed 
opinions about the better and worser examples of each quantitatively.






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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[gⅼеɳ ☣]

A better Feynman quote that targets this issue is this one, I think from a BBC 
interview:

"When you doubt and ask, it gets a little harder to believe. I can live with 
doubt, and uncertainty, and not knowing. I think it's much more interesting to 
live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong. I have approximate 
answers, and possible beliefs, and different degrees of certainty about 
different things. I'm not absolutely sure of anything. And there are many 
things Ι don't know anything about. But Ι don't have to know an answer. I don't 
... Ι don't feel frightened by not knowing things, by being lost in the unverse 
without having any purpose, which is the way it really is as far as Ι can tell, 
possibly. It doesn't frighten me."

He was talking in the context of religion, but I think it applies to every type 
of "knowledge", including the "thought manipulation" that is philosophy.  The 
point is not that "thought manipulation" can never be useful.  But that one can 
_justifiably_ take the position that philosophy should (moral imperative) be 
done in the _service_ of something else.

You cited Smullyan in the OP, which is relevant.  Many of Smullyan's 
publications are puzzles, games.  Some of us simply enjoy puzzles. (I don't.) 
But every puzzle is a math problem.  It's up to the puzzle solver to settle on 
why they're solving puzzles.  Are they doing it because it FEELS good?  Or are 
they doing it because either the solutions or the exercises facilitate some 
other objective?  Some puzzle solvers (e.g. video gamers) find themselves in a 
defensive position, trying to justify their fetish against the world around 
them.  The silly rancor many "practical" people aim at philosophers can make 
some of them defensive.  And it's a real shame that we shame philosophers for 
doing it just because they enjoy it.

But it moves from merely shameful to outright dangerous when a philosopher 
can't distinguish their own _why_.  Someone who does it because it's fun 
shouldn't waste any time yapping about how useful it is.  And someone who does 
it because it's useful shouldn't waste any time yapping about how fun it is.  
Get over it.  Be confident.  Engage your fetish and ignore the nay-sayers.

On 09/21/2017 09:53 AM, Steven A Smith wrote:
> Glen -
> 
> I share your use of the term "Science" as in being an activity (roughly) 
> defined by "the Scientific Method" just as I use the term "Art" as the 
> process rather than the product (aka "Artifact").
> 
> When I do anything vaguely (or presumptively) artistic, I think of my role as 
> that of an "Artifex" more than an "Artist" because I feel more emphasis on 
> the conception/making than on being tuned into or tied into a larger, higher 
> group/power which is how I read "Art and Artist".  I have a similar 
> ambivalence about "Scientist/Science".   Despite degrees in Math and Physics, 
> my practice has rarely involved actual Science (or more math than just really 
> fancy arithmetic), though I have worked with "real Scientists" and close to 
> "Scientific Progress" for most of my life.   I don't even think of my work as 
> having been that of an Engineer, but truly much closer to simply that of a 
> "Technologist".   And as everyone who has read my missives here can attest, 
> my throwdown as a "Philosopher" is equally detuned... but suspect myself to 
> oscillate wildly between the poles of "Philosopher" and "Philistine".   All 
> that rattled off, I truly value having enough understanding of all of these
> ideals to recognize the differences qualitatively, and to have mildly 
> informed opinions about the better and worser examples of each quantitatively.


-- 
☣ gⅼеɳ


FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[gⅼеɳ ☣]

It's definitely sage.  But the sagacity doesn't hinge on the word "science", it 
hinges on the word _useful_.  Science is often thought to be a body of 
knowledge.  But there's a huge swath of people, me included, who think science 
is not knowledge, but a method/behavior for formulating and testing hypotheses. 
 It's not clear to me that Feynman actually said this.  But Feynman is a good 
candidate because he cared far more about what you _do_ than what you claim to 
_know_.

Philosophy (of anything) can be useful.  But to any working scientist, it is 
far less useful than, say, glass blowing, programming, or cell sorting.  And if 
you think distinguishing between the usefulness of beakers from the usefulness 
of ... oh, let's say Popper's 3 worlds, then your expression says more about 
you than it does about them.


On 09/20/2017 08:27 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> By the way, the Feynman quote is really dumb, and it’s annoying that people 
> keep trotting it out as if it was sage.  The reason birds can’t make use of 
> ornithology is they can’t read. Think how useful it would be for a cuckoo 
> host to be able to spend a few hours reading a text on egg identification.   
> Is the reason physicists can’t make use of philosophy of science that they 
> can’t think?  I doubt anyone who cites this “aphorism” would come to that 
> conclusion.  Bad metaphor. 

-- 
☣ gⅼеɳ


FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Frank Wimberly]

As a well-known philosopher once said, any one who criticizes philosophy is
a fellow philosopher.  I can cite the reference if anyone cares.

Frank

Frank Wimberly
Phone (505) 670-9918

On Sep 20, 2017 9:27 PM, "Nick Thompson"  wrote:

> Peirce’s Pragmati[ci]sm is actually a generalization of the logic of
> experimental science to all of philosophy.  Quite splendid, actually.
>
>
>
> By the way, the Feynman quote is really dumb, and it’s annoying that
> people keep trotting it out as if it was sage.  The reason birds can’t make
> use of ornithology is they can’t read. Think how useful it would be for a
> cuckoo host to be able to spend a few hours reading a text on egg
> identification.   Is the reason physicists can’t make use of philosophy of
> science that they can’t think?  I doubt anyone who cites this “aphorism”
> would come to that conclusion.  Bad metaphor.
>
>
>
> Nick
>
>
>
> Nicholas S. Thompson
>
> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
>
> Clark University
>
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
>
>
>
> *From:* Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] *On Behalf Of *Steven A
> Smith
> *Sent:* Wednesday, September 20, 2017 5:51 PM
> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <
> friam@redfish.com>
> *Subject:* [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia
>
>
>
> Tangentially on the topic of Philosophy v. Physics,  in my review of
> Dempster-Shaffer (to avoid making too stupid of misrepresentations on my
> bumper-sticker) I was fascinated to find Raymond Smullyan's "Types of
> Reasoners" reduced to formal logic (but also couched in natural language
> explanations).
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doxastic_logic#Types_of_reasoners
>
> FWIW, I contend that *LOGIC* is used (critical to) in the natural sciences
> but does not *arise from* them... it arises from Philosophy (Epistemology)
> and is formalized in Mathematics and merely USED by Science.
>
> I don't know if someone already quoted Feynman on the topic:
> "philosophy of science is as useful to scientists as ornithology is to
> birds."
>
> I suspect that if birds had the type of consciousness that included
> self-image/awareness and the abstractions of language, that *some* would at
> least find ornithology *interesting* and might even find some practical
> ways to apply what they learn from "the study of birds".But no, for the
> first part it wouldn't make them better fliers, predators, foragers,
> scavengers, etc.   And most *good* Scientists I know don't know much about
> or care about the larger roles of Epistemology and Metaphysics, which
> *sometimes* leads them to believe they have answered the hard questions
> outside of the bounds of Empirical Science *with* Empirical Science?   Like
> the "spherical cow", they just "assume away" the features that their
> measurements and models don't/can't address (much less answer).
>
> Mumble,
>  - Steve
>
> 
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove
>

FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Nick Thompson]

Peirce’s Pragmati[ci]sm is actually a generalization of the logic of 
experimental science to all of philosophy.  Quite splendid, actually. 

 

By the way, the Feynman quote is really dumb, and it’s annoying that people 
keep trotting it out as if it was sage.  The reason birds can’t make use of 
ornithology is they can’t read. Think how useful it would be for a cuckoo host 
to be able to spend a few hours reading a text on egg identification.   Is the 
reason physicists can’t make use of philosophy of science that they can’t 
think?  I doubt anyone who cites this “aphorism” would come to that conclusion. 
 Bad metaphor.  

 

Nick  

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

  
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Steven A Smith
Sent: Wednesday, September 20, 2017 5:51 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group 
Subject: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

 

Tangentially on the topic of Philosophy v. Physics,  in my review of 
Dempster-Shaffer (to avoid making too stupid of misrepresentations on my 
bumper-sticker) I was fascinated to find Raymond Smullyan's "Types of 
Reasoners" reduced to formal logic (but also couched in natural language 
explanations).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doxastic_logic#Types_of_reasoners

FWIW, I contend that *LOGIC* is used (critical to) in the natural sciences but 
does not *arise from* them... it arises from Philosophy (Epistemology) and is 
formalized in Mathematics and merely USED by Science.

I don't know if someone already quoted Feynman on the topic:
"philosophy of science is as useful to scientists as ornithology is to 
birds."

I suspect that if birds had the type of consciousness that included 
self-image/awareness and the abstractions of language, that *some* would at 
least find ornithology *interesting* and might even find some practical ways to 
apply what they learn from "the study of birds".But no, for the first part 
it wouldn't make them better fliers, predators, foragers, scavengers, etc.   
And most *good* Scientists I know don't know much about or care about the 
larger roles of Epistemology and Metaphysics, which *sometimes* leads them to 
believe they have answered the hard questions outside of the bounds of 
Empirical Science *with* Empirical Science?   Like the "spherical cow", they 
just "assume away" the features that their measurements and models don't/can't 
address (much less answer).   

Mumble,
 - Steve


FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

Re: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

[Marcus Daniels]

In a design, I think it is useful to tolerate confusion about some things (e.g. 
not identifying some types or their domains, or whether certain propositions 
are true) even though other parts are clear.   It involves ratcheting things 
down in a breadth-first or depth-first way, depending on the situation.   From 
a fitness perspective, it is not useful to have just true and false.  That does 
not guide selection in a useful way.   And late binding just sweeps the problem 
under the rug by allowing for a little more measurement of fitness (before a 
paradox or crash).   Evolving designs need that English teacher that can 
mark-up an essay end-to-end and advise that some parts need to be thrown away 
and other parts just need minor tweaks – multi-criteria fitness for sure.  
Logic by itself does not accomplish that.   Some of these species of reasoners 
are better at synthesis than the `accurate reasoner’.

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Steven A Smith
Sent: Wednesday, September 20, 2017 3:51 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group 
Subject: [FRIAM] Doxastic logic - Wikipedia

Tangentially on the topic of Philosophy v. Physics,  in my review of 
Dempster-Shaffer (to avoid making too stupid of misrepresentations on my 
bumper-sticker) I was fascinated to find Raymond Smullyan's "Types of 
Reasoners" reduced to formal logic (but also couched in natural language 
explanations).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doxastic_logic#Types_of_reasoners
FWIW, I contend that *LOGIC* is used (critical to) in the natural sciences but 
does not *arise from* them... it arises from Philosophy (Epistemology) and is 
formalized in Mathematics and merely USED by Science.

I don't know if someone already quoted Feynman on the topic:
"philosophy of science is as useful to scientists as ornithology is to 
birds."

I suspect that if birds had the type of consciousness that included 
self-image/awareness and the abstractions of language, that *some* would at 
least find ornithology *interesting* and might even find some practical ways to 
apply what they learn from "the study of birds".But no, for the first part 
it wouldn't make them better fliers, predators, foragers, scavengers, etc.   
And most *good* Scientists I know don't know much about or care about the 
larger roles of Epistemology and Metaphysics, which *sometimes* leads them to 
believe they have answered the hard questions outside of the bounds of 
Empirical Science *with* Empirical Science?   Like the "spherical cow", they 
just "assume away" the features that their measurements and models don't/can't 
address (much less answer).

Mumble,
 - Steve

FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove