Would you buy it?

[Atomist]

You're equivocating the word "justification." I'm not using the layman's context. I'm using the epistemic context.

Justification is rigorous in epistemology; it doesn't just mean any ol' thing people use as an excuse to believe. In epistemology justification is what provides warrant to believe rationally.

My bad... then my comment is not-applicable. I'm not a fan of language... :-(

 

[Meow Mix]

My bad... then my comment is not-applicable. I'm not a fan of language... :-(

It's really just the English language that does that :\

It's so easy for us to equivocate the scientific and layman terms for "theory..."

Also the epistemic and layman terms for "justification..."

There's also a few contexts of the word "faith," some of them rational and others not... (e.g. faith as in inductively asserting it's probable the sun will appear to rise tomorrow is reasonable, but believing something exists without evidence is not)

There's a lot of equivocation between the words "atheism" and "agnosticism" as we all know here...

Etc. etc.

English just reuses too many words!

 

[Meow Mix]

I'm not sure of the context... so hopefully I'm not strawmanning you too bad and is probably not relevant to the discussion at hand, but I find this pretty cool so I'll continue.

This is a pretty good representation of classical logic, but this type of logic has flaws... like the law of excluded middle is problematic in this
Sorites Paradox:
1,000,000 grains of sand is a heap of sand (Premise 1)
A heap of sand minus one grain is still a heap. (Premise 2)
... repeat premise 2
Conclusion 0 grains of sand is a heap of sand.

One solution to the is assign truth values between 0 (false) and 1 (true) to the statements. so say like 0 grains of sand is has a truth value of 0 and 1,000,000 has a truth value of 1 and everything in between has a value in between 0 and 1.

The problem lies in premise 2.

If a "heap" is 1,000,000 grains of sand then it isn't a "heap" in the exact same sense with 999,999 grains of sand.

Otherwise you're saying A = ¬A.

Categorical umbrellas like "heaps," "flocks," "craploads" and so on are subjectively defined, and the premises above fail to provide a full definition and therefore fail the law of identity and are therefore nonsense.

Given a full definition (even a subjective one, such as "A heap is anything ≥ 100 grains of sand") the paradox goes away. It's a paradox because it ignores identity and states A = ¬A. (All paradoxes are, by definition, violations of identity or its corrolaries)

 

[Atomist]

The problem lies in premise 2.

If a "heap" is 1,000,000 grains of sand then it isn't a "heap" in the exact same sense with 999,999 grains of sand.

Otherwise you're saying A = ¬A.

Categorical umbrellas like "heaps," "flocks," "craploads" and so on are subjectively defined, and the premises above fail to provide a full definition and therefore fail the law of identity and are therefore nonsense.

Given a full definition (even a subjective one, such as "A heap is anything ≥ 100 grains of sand") the paradox goes away. It's a paradox because it ignores identity and states A = ¬A. (All paradoxes are, by definition, violations of identity or its corrolaries)

Yes... but any definition you give for heap is completely arbitrary... as there is not finite number that you can say X is a heap but X-1 is a heap. But heap greater than some X... which is reasonable to assume is smaller than 1,000,000 and 999,999...

that's why in many cases Fussy logic works better... I just like pointing it out because I think Fussy logic is so cool...

I mean sure you can force feed everything into classical/binary logic and it'll work, but not everything is either one or the other unless you arbitrarily define everything.

I'm not saying classical logic doesn't work...because it works great... but fussy logic works better in "categorical umbrella" which happens to be a lot of words that we use.

 

[Meow Mix]

Yes... but any definition you give for heap is completely arbitrary... as there is not finite number that you can say X is a heap but X-1 is a heap. But heap greater than some X... which is reasonable to assume is smaller than 1,000,000 and 999,999...

that's why in many cases Fussy logic works better... I just like pointing it out because I think Fussy logic is so cool...

I mean sure you can force feed everything into classical/binary logic and it'll work, but not everything is either one or the other unless you arbitrarily define everything.

I'm not saying classical logic doesn't work...because it works great... but fussy logic works better in "categorical umbrella" which happens to be a lot of words that we use.

Logic is ontological, things either exist or they don't.

"Heaps" don't exist; it's classificational: that's why there's an apparent breakdown. But as I think we agree, there isn't an actual breakdown. Modal logics, "fuzzy" logics, category theories, computational logics, etc. are great for classificational statements because they just make things easier for us to think about, but it's never actually possible to break logic itself.

For instance it's easily possible to define heaps of sand with logic using sets; it's just understood that the set (heap) of 1,000,000 grains is ontologically distinct from the set (heap) of 999,999 grains. Continuous logics just make it more friendly for the English language (or any spoken language).

 

[Herr Heinrich]

A company is selling a box with wonderful attributes. After all, it explains why evil exists and how the world was created. Furthermore it grants you eternal life. Sometimes if you ask it for things then it will happen for you, other times it won't (the box is temperamental, or has a higher purpose that it doesn't want your wishes to inferfere with sometimes). Many people who've purchased the box have had good things happen to them and many gained a lot of self-confidence to drop drugs and other things like that. In fact, there were a few people who had their cancer go into remission inexplicably after purchasing the box! There are even reports of people hearing the magic in the box. One time, there was a cloud that looked exactly like the box -- logo and everything.

The catch is, though, that you can never look inside it while you're alive; or scan or probe it. Also the box is $1,000 USD.

Sorry, you get most of the benefits of the box after you both purchase the box and then die (don't worry, eternity and all those answers are waiting for you inside the box right?)

So, who here would buy the box? Surely $1,000 and taking some time to whisper desires and thankfulness to it as well as taking the time to indoctrinate the children towards getting their own boxes* is worth the time, right?

(* - you DO want them to live forever right?)

If not, why not?

I think it's incredibly obvious what I'm getting at here.

Edit: Also the box still works even if it's physically destroyed because you live eternally inside the spiritual box. So, nobody can point to the fact that some of the boxes will decay after a person's death and use that as evidence that the box's claims of immortality are false.

Where can I find one of these boxes madam? I am willing to sell my child to purchase one if I have to.

 

[Gloone]

Hey, I bought a box and it wasn’t everything I thought it was going to be. Can I get my money back?

 

[Meow Mix]

To answer all the money back questions: Sure, I'll give you $500 back, but unfortunately to make it fit with the analogy to investing in religions once you waste some of your time there is NO getting all of it back. Sorry

 

[Atomist]

Logic is ontological, things either exist or they don't.

"Heaps" don't exist; it's classificational: that's why there's an apparent breakdown. But as I think we agree, there isn't an actual breakdown. Modal logics, "fuzzy" logics, category theories, computational logics, etc. are great for classificational statements because they just make things easier for us to think about, but it's never actually possible to break logic itself.

For instance it's easily possible to define heaps of sand with logic using sets; it's just understood that the set (heap) of 1,000,000 grains is ontologically distinct from the set (heap) of 999,999 grains. Continuous logics just make it more friendly for the English language.

Yeah... and having a logic system that is more friendly to the English language (the language we use) is worse than having a logic system that force us to be arbitrary in definition?

 

[Gloone]

To answer all the money back questions: Sure, I'll give you $500 back, but unfortunately to make it fit with the analogy to investing in religions once you waste some of your time there is NO getting all of it back. Sorry

so if money means nothing to me, will I have been wasting my time with the investment?

 

[Meow Mix]

Yeah... and having a logic system that is more friendly to the English language (the language we use) is worse than having a logic system that force us to be arbitrary in definition?

Not at all. All valid logics, though, comply with basic logic.

Even the concept of fuzzy logics is just smoother language for sets.

A "heap" is a set, and just like the "set of all even numbers" and the "set of all odd numbers" are different sets they are still "sets."

This is exactly the same as "the heap of 1,000,000 grians of sand" and the "heap of 999,999 grains of sand." It just sounds strange to call 0 grains of sand a "heap" because the English language assigns "heap" an arbitrary classification as a subjective group.

If you just use the word "set" the problem goes away. "The set of 0 grains of sand" is perfectly rational and exists -- represented by the character Ø or by empty brackets { }. There is no true logical contradiction or paradox.

The "paradox" comes from the arbitrary English, not the objective logic. Thus the continuous logics which disguise sets as continuous entities rather than discrete sets: but it's still just a disguise. It's still based wholly on basic logic. Just more convenient for spoken language.

Edit: I guess what I'm trying to say is that there aren't really different logics to choose from.

There is still just logic. There are just different syntaxes and languages to speak logic in, but they all say the same thing. Just like I can say 2/3 or 4/6: different ways of saying the same thing.

 

[Herr Heinrich]

You aren't very good at selling things. You won't even tell me where to purchase a box. I think I will take my money and go purchase the cube-for-putting-things-into. The cube-for-putting-things-into is the true magical-surprise-inside-packing-item anyway. So there!

 

[Gloone]

You aren't very good at selling things. You won't even tell me where to purchase a box. I think I will take my money and go purchase the cube-for-putting-things-into. The cube-for-putting-things-into is the true magical-surprise-inside-packing-item anyway. So there!

Hmm... you will have to tell me more about this cube-for-putting-things-into, I am already interested.

 

[Atomist]

Edit: I guess what I'm trying to say is that there aren't really different logics to choose from.

There is still just logic. There are just different syntaxes and languages to speak logic in, but they all say the same thing. Just like I can say 2/3 or 4/6: different ways of saying the same thing.

Well the law of excluded middle doesn't really exist in multi-valued logic (since something can be as much a heap as not a heap) that was the main point.. But yes... there is just logic.

 

[Herr Heinrich]

Hmm... you will have to tell me more about this cube-for-putting-things-into, I am already interested.

Well you see the cube-for-putting-things-into grants all the same benefits as the box and then some. And all you have to do for the cube-for-putting-stuff-into is kill all of the people who bought the box. Simple. After that the cube-for-putting-things-into opens and you get all the super-orgasmic-sex-toys-of-wonder-and-power inside...Plus some virgins.
If that isn't your cup of tea then there is also the tube-of-random-junk. It appears to be filled with junk at first, but once you concentrate on it for a really really really really long time it will eventually open. Inside there will actually be nothing. You will then be enlightened. There aren't any virgins though. Sorry.

 

[Gloone]

Well you see the cube-for-putting-things-into grants all the same benefits as the box and then some. And all you have to do for the cube-for-putting-stuff-into is kill all of the people who bought the box. Simple. After that the cube-for-putting-things-into opens and you get all the super-orgasmic-sex-toys-of-wonder-and-power inside...Plus some virgins.
If that isn't your cup of tea then there is also the tube-of-random-junk. It appears to be filled with junk at first, but once you concentrate on it for a really really really really long time it will eventually open. Inside there will actually be nothing. You will then be enlightened. There aren't any virgins though. Sorry.

I was expecting for the cube-for-putting-things-into to have more of a purpose than that. I found a-box-souls when I opened the first box that supposedly was not capable of being opened. Maybe it will hold more value than the tube-of-random-junk.

 

[Herr Heinrich]

I was expecting for the cube-for-putting-things-into to have more of a purpose than that. I found a-box-souls when I opened the first box that supposedly was not capable of being opened. Maybe it will hold more value than the tube-of-random-junk.

Interesting. Seriously though. You should really get the cube-of-putting-things-into though. Although it is a cube of peace it will still kill you maliciously for not buying it.

 

[Gloone]

Interesting. Seriously though. You should really get the cube-of-putting-things-into though. Although it is a cube of peace it will still kill you maliciously for not buying it.

Well seeing how I don't fear death, I think I will go with the box-of-souls, it seems more promising and I will have something to look forward to after I'm gone.

 

[McBell]

Sorites Paradox:
1,000,000 grains of sand is a heap of sand (Premise 1)
A heap of sand minus one grain is still a heap. (Premise 2)
... repeat premise 2
Conclusion 0 grains of sand is a heap of sand.

One solution to the is assign truth values between 0 (false) and 1 (true) to the statements. so say like 0 grains of sand is has a truth value of 0 and 1,000,000 has a truth value of 1 and everything in between has a value in between 0 and 1.

Define heap.
Seems to me that a heap is bigger than a pile.
A pile is two grains of sand, that is IF the two are stacked one on another.
Thus a heap would have to be at least three grains of sand, so long as they are stacked upon on another.

Therefore the above conclusion cannot be correct unless you redefine the word heap.

 

[Herr Heinrich]

Well seeing how I don't fear death, I think I will go with the box-of-souls, it seems more promising and I will have something to look forward to after I'm gone.

Well just so you know people who don't buy the cube-of-putting-things-into go to the Incinerator-of-burning-and-lost-mail when they die. So...You know. Just a thought.