Philosophokiddies

Stephen D. Williams sdw at lig.net
Tue Sep 6 21:56:08 PDT 2016


On 9/6/16 8:13 PM, Steve Kinney wrote:
>
>
> On 09/06/2016 10:14 PM, Stephen D. Williams wrote:
> > On 9/6/16 7:07 PM, juan wrote:
> >> On Tue, 6 Sep 2016 22:23:59 -0300 Cecilia Tanaka
> >> <cecilia.tanaka at gmail.com> wrote:
> >>
> >>> I make jokes with Zen, but I respect him too.  Just hate his
> >>> love for some politicians, like Putin and Trump.  Every person
> >>> has own value, but I really abominate politicians, ugh!  :P
> >> We should be trashing *all* politicians including, of course,
> >> putin. But again, a fair amount of people in this list
> >> hysterically disagree with the idea of getting rid of politicians
> >> and their state. Just ask dear Stephen...
> >>
>
> > Find something better first, and prove it.
>
> Proofs only exist in formal systems like maths and geometry, and then
> only because those systems expressly define what constitutes a proof
> within the given system.  In the real world, one may collect evidence
> based on observation, analysis and experiment, leading to varying
> degrees of confidence in various conclusions:  A massive weight of
> evidence supports the first law of thermodynamics, but no one will
> ever prove it "true."

Providing proof doesn't necessarily mean "2 nines" or "a proof" in the mathematical sense.  You can win a civil case with a
"preponderance" of the proof, >50% for instance.  But you need some good evidence in larger and larger test cases.

To have a serious discussion, you at least need to have a good theoretical basis that involves reasoning about known aspects of
human nature, psychology, and sociology that might plausibly work.

>
> In purely practical terms, demonstrating that one economic and social
> system works better than another economic and social system depends on
> two things:  The definition of "better" and observation of full scale
> practical implementations.  The massive number of variables, feedbacks
> and turbulence in economic and social systems rule out accurately
> predicting outcomes based on thought experiments or simulations.
>
> "Proof" invokes two value reasoning, which strongly appeals to human
> cognitive and emotional biases but can not accurately model any but
> the very simplest of systems in the material world.  Propagandists
> love to exploit two value reasoning:  I have found that the presence
> of the word "proof" in the title of a story circulated on the Internet
> identifies a deceptive or delusion-based story with about two nines
> confidence.
>
> Two value reasoning creates and strongly supports irrational,
> delusional, and counter-productive belief systems - especially in the
> sphere of political ideology.  Are you done thinking and ready to
> impose your will on all the idiots and assholes who disagree with you
> by force?  Then "proof" is your golden ticket to rationalizing
> violence as a moral imperative for the greater good.
>
> :o/
>
>
>
>
sdw

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