What does it mean for something to be "logically possible"?

[Kharakov]

Yeah, a continuous checkboard is used to play a game with discrete moves. To me, it looks like someone is applying rules to continuous space to play a discrete game.

Hey, chessboards exist in a universe we assume by default as continuous so we can only see them as such. But the rules of chess, and that of all board games, provide a good model for discrete space. But it can only help if you're prepared to think about it in those terms.

The whole thing reminds me a bit of the node (graph) based quantum mechanical universe of Schild's Ladder, by Greg Egan.

Still, the whole problem IS the Bell's Inequality thing- it basically implies a single contiguous structure in contact with all particles in spacetime (or at least a single structure that is contiguous with all possibly interacting particles with another particle).

I don't believe in the physical reality of space.

Really? Wow. Do you think the global GPS system is fake? You don't think, even if space is discrete (individual locations containing individual information that follows specific rules for transmission: sort of like a neural net or a brain...), that the individual locations are space?

Do you mean you believe volume is fake? Do you think that gravitational interactions that depend on the stress energy tensor (simplified: mass/energy in a volume of space) are fake? Do you think we live in a simulation (another thing that nobody can prove is false)?

Locations don't actually need to touch each other. It was only to get you a better angle. All we need is that things can move from one location to any of its neighbour locations. It's to be seen as a basic property. You don't need anything else except how many neighbours each location has.

Ok, so if something needs to go off in a new direction, say it's 100000 light years away, and it is aimed 1 Hydrogen atoms distance to the left, there aren't a whole bunch of new points needed in between the 2 objects, instead the photon (or whatever) just knows to shift over an atom's length over 100000 light years? There are no new points in space that the photon has to cross?

It's way more complicated than simple, continuous space. If you don't have straight lines of "space points" between 2 things, they would need special rules to shift over and interact with long distant thingies.

Can you think of any arguments against this type of space (other than physical observations not supporting its existence)?

A model is wrong if either it does not fit the empirical evidence or it is self-contradictory. So, no, I don't know.

Well, since we can use a computer to simulate the continuous universe, we can obviously write discrete code that creates the equivalent of continuous actions. It's the fact that we have to diligently write the code that should make it apparent that a discrete universe implies a designer. It just wouldn't evolve in the case of discrete space (and what would time be- since any change in the system would happen instantaneously, wouldn't it be continuous? Doesn't time have to be continuous?).

And yeah- your whole proposition resembles the Game of Life to me.

 

[untermensche]

If I were a glutton for punishment I would have to go somewhere else.

It is only a very big delusion that I am being punished at all.

There are people who think things like infinity is real.

I am the one that punishes them.

You refuse to make any arguments because I have slapped you around so many times.

You're right. I'm sure that's what everyone who knows me thinks. I am easily intimidated. I run away from challenges.


Did you ever make a successful argument? I didn't notice that you did. If you could repeat it, I would enjoy reading it.

Start reading this thread. I have made dozens.

They are in black and white. Not hiding somewhere.

 

[untermensche]

..a civil approach? With untermenche? RU4 real?

I don't respect bad ideas.

And I will try to mock them and show how ridiculous they are.

Like the idea that some infinity is logically possible.

An incredibly asinine idea.

As good as saying Santa Clause is a logical possibility.

 

[Kharakov]

FDI: You have arrived at the great chasm of the realm of Sar. There is a rickety bridge. Will you cross it?

 

[beero1000]

 

[Kharakov]

Did you ever make a successful argument? I didn't notice that you did. If you could repeat it, I would enjoy reading it.

Start reading this thread. I have made dozens.

They are in black and white. Not hiding somewhere.

Wow. Really? Can you quote one?

I'm sorry, but the thread is long, and I think I've only ever seen you make a valid argument once, and I thought it was by accident, to tell you the truth. Like it slipped through your "make sure my argument is invalid" filter.

- - - Updated - - -

As good as saying Santa Clause is a logical possibility.

Santa Clause is a logical possibility. It just isn't necessarily a physical possibility in our universe.

 

[Speakpigeon]

Hey, chessboards exist in a universe we assume by default as continuous so we can only see them as such. But the rules of chess, and that of all board games, provide a good model for discrete space. But it can only help if you're prepared to think about it in those terms.

The whole thing reminds me a bit of the node (graph) based quantum mechanical universe of Schild's Ladder, by Greg Egan.

I will have to trust you on that.

Still, the whole problem IS the Bell's Inequality thing- it basically implies a single contiguous structure in contact with all particles in spacetime (or at least a single structure that is contiguous with all possibly interacting particles with another particle).

I guess it only looks too counterintuitive if you stick to our default, intuitive view of space. If you can let go of that then all solutions become acceptable, irrespective of whether you feel incredulous about them. And then you can decide which of these solutions offers better value.

I don't believe in the physical reality of space.

Really? Wow. Do you think the global GPS system is fake?

The question is what do we mean by physical space. Two possibilities: the actual but possibly unknowable real space. Or, second possibility, the mental representation we have of real space. Children know their mental representation well before any science could tell them there is something else so we grow up with the mental representation as unique reference and we get used to thinking of real space in terms of this mental representation, without even realising that's what we're doing. Of course, by physical space we also mean real space, but that's only because we take our mental representation to be real space just like when you look at a tree you think it is the real tree, not a mental representation of something that appears to you as a tree-like thing.

So if the physicality of space is but an appearance, we are screwed for what real space is really like or even whether there's any space at all outside our mental representation of reality.

You don't think, even if space is discrete (individual locations containing individual information that follows specific rules for transmission: sort of like a neural net or a brain...), that the individual locations are space?

Our mental representation of space is continuous. But maybe there's no space at all, just our mental representation of certain relations between real things. These relations may be anything. They may be discrete or continuous without being anything like what we think of as physical space.

Do you mean you believe volume is fake? Do you think that gravitational interactions that depend on the stress energy tensor (simplified: mass/energy in a volume of space) are fake? Do you think we live in a simulation (another thing that nobody can prove is false)?

Maybe volume only exists in our mental representation of reality.

To understand that you cannot exclude entirely the possibility that you are living in a simulation is to understand that your mental representation may be essentially arbitrary as to likeness. That is to say, reality may well be seriously different from our mental representation of reality.

Locations don't actually need to touch each other. It was only to get you a better angle. All we need is that things can move from one location to any of its neighbour locations. It's to be seen as a basic property. You don't need anything else except how many neighbours each location has.

Ok, so if something needs to go off in a new direction, say it's 100000 light years away, and it is aimed 1 Hydrogen atoms distance to the left, there aren't a whole bunch of new points needed in between the 2 objects, instead the photon (or whatever) just knows to shift over an atom's length over 100000 light years? There are no new points in space that the photon has to cross?

It all depends on why it is that a photon takes any particular route. There are many possible models for that.

It's way more complicated than simple, continuous space. If you don't have straight lines of "space points" between 2 things, they would need special rules to shift over and interact with long distant thingies.

Sure but you already forgot the situation you yourself described with Bell's inequality that there has to be "a single contiguous structure in contact with all possibly interacting particles with another particle". Isn't that complicated too?

Well, since we can use a computer to simulate the continuous universe, we can obviously write discrete code that creates the equivalent of continuous actions. It's the fact that we have to diligently write the code that should make it apparent that a discrete universe implies a designer. It just wouldn't evolve in the case of discrete space (and what would time be- since any change in the system would happen instantaneously, wouldn't it be continuous? Doesn't time have to be continuous?).

I fail to see why real time would have to be continuous. All we need is a simple rule to explain how time behaves and see if this can explain empirical data. And real time does not need to be anything like what we think of time as being. Our intuitive representation of time may well be almost entirely irrelevant. I thought this point was now well understood after Quantum Physics and Relativity!
EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

View attachment 12100

Little kitty is looking at how I see myself in the mirror.
EB

 

[untermensche]

Start reading this thread. I have made dozens.

They are in black and white. Not hiding somewhere.

Wow. Really? Can you quote one?

Do I have to? Can you not read?

As good as saying Santa Clause is a logical possibility.

Santa Clause is a logical possibility. It just isn't necessarily a physical possibility in our universe.

Hard to surmount such an incredible argument.

So where does or did this bearded man who delivers toys to millions with a flying sled exist if he is logically possible?

 

[untermensche]

View attachment 12100

Gosh.

I never considered such a thing possible with my greatness and all that.

But when people are reduced to this and have no rational arguments I know I am at least better than them.

 

[ryan]

Pride?

If people talk about me and not ideas they will be called out for it.

I answer ideas with ideas and stupid criticisms that are nothing but opinion with the same.

I am the only one who tried to see your argument through in a serious manor while being as rational as I could, and you have bailed on me at least 3 times in the past month.

Kharakov might be right about you being a glutton for punishment. You seem more interested in the conflict than the actual argument.

 

[beero1000]

Gosh.

I never considered such a thing possible with my greatness and all that.

But when people are reduced to this and have no rational arguments I know I am at least better than them.

What's the point? You have refused to acknowledge even the most ludicrous of your mistakes when they were pointed out to you in detail. Yet you persist.

You'd think you might have learned something by now, but it doesn't seem like you even bother to really read peoples' responses, making all of this just a colossal waste of time. Mockery is at least entertaining for a while until it gets depressing again.

 

[untermensche]

Gosh.

I never considered such a thing possible with my greatness and all that.

But when people are reduced to this and have no rational arguments I know I am at least better than them.

What's the point? You have refused to acknowledge even the most ludicrous of your mistakes when they were pointed out to you in detail. Yet you persist.

Yet you have no ready example. Just a claim.

I guess I am forced to live with my big mistakes. Like knowing the difference between an imaginary concept and a real thing.

You'd think you might have learned something by now, but it doesn't seem like you even bother to really read peoples' responses, making all of this just a colossal waste of time. Mockery is at least entertaining for a while until it gets depressing again.

I read everything people write. I don't have time for research projects if others demand.

But again you make no salient point or present anything to consider.

I will wallow in my ignorance and suffer I suppose.

 

[untermensche]

Pride?

If people talk about me and not ideas they will be called out for it.

I answer ideas with ideas and stupid criticisms that are nothing but opinion with the same.

I am the only one who tried to see your argument through in a serious manor while being as rational as I could, and you have bailed on me at least 3 times in the past month.

Kharakov might be right about you being a glutton for punishment. You seem more interested in the conflict than the actual argument.

I do not bail on you. I have responded to you many many times.

And I respond seriously if the argument is serious.

You have not shown me how infinity differs from the Easter Bunny.

One is an imaginary concept about some series going on without end and the other makes children happy.

Do you think you could chop something real up infinitely?

Suppose you chop up the movement of some object infinitely and the object makes the smallest possible move forward.

How far has it moved?

 

[bilby]

I am the only one who tried to see your argument through in a serious manor while being as rational as I could, and you have bailed on me at least 3 times in the past month.

Kharakov might be right about you being a glutton for punishment. You seem more interested in the conflict than the actual argument.

I do not bail on you. I have responded to you many many times.

And I respond seriously if the argument is serious.

You have not shown me how infinity differs from the Easter Bunny.

One is an imaginary concept about some series going on without end and the other makes children happy.

Do you think you could chop something real up infinitely?

Suppose you chop up the movement of some object infinitely and the object makes the smallest possible move forward.

How far has it moved?

If you can chop up the movement infinitely, then there is no smallest possible movement, by definition.

 

[untermensche]

I do not bail on you. I have responded to you many many times.

And I respond seriously if the argument is serious.

You have not shown me how infinity differs from the Easter Bunny.

One is an imaginary concept about some series going on without end and the other makes children happy.

Do you think you could chop something real up infinitely?

Suppose you chop up the movement of some object infinitely and the object makes the smallest possible move forward.

How far has it moved?

If you can chop up the movement infinitely, then there is no smallest possible movement, by definition.

No kidding.

It becomes an absurdity instantly to even try it.

I want to move the smallest possible amount and that is impossible. I can only move some distance that is not the smallest distance possible.

If I can only possibly move something that is not the smallest distance possible how do we claim distance can be divided infinitely?

 

[Kharakov]

How long does the universe stay in its present state?

Is the change of state instantaneous?

How many instantaneous changes occur in one second?

 

[fast]

So, I was eating some jumbo peanuts (and they were large, salty, hot, and yummy too, I might add) and started thinking about this thread. Yep, there I was, driving along, eating, thinking, and throwing shells out (and wondering why cars get closer when the inadvertent shells hit them.) But anyhow, not every peanut was jumbo in size. Some were smaller (well, a few were anyhow), but they were all jumbo peanuts--came from the same strain.

The confusion between a logical possibility and a logical possibility is the same kind of confusion that is found between a jumbo peanut and a jumbo peanut. Wait, huh, what? The new strain of peanut that produces unusually large peanuts and shells needed to be named. We could have named it Strain 78. Had we done so, no one would argue that the smaller peanuts in the yield are not from Strain 78.

Untermensche's refusal to accept that "Santa exists is a logical possibility"has more to do with the name. I can envision him arguing that the runt size peanuts are not jumbo peanuts. That's the danger of treating single two-worded terms as two single-worded terms.

Yes, "jumbo" was used to name the new strain. Why not, most from the strain were jumbo in size. But the description wasn't perfect because it failed to account for the smaller peanuts from the strain? Names aren't perfect.

To discuss a possibility that isn't logical (whatever that might mean) should not be misconstrued with discussing a possibility that is logical (whatever that might mean). Call that A and B.

When we discuss whether something is a logical possibility (C) (something wholly different than B), we don't concern ourselves with the things Untermensche brings up, and that's because he insists on focusing on what "logical" means, as if it's to be used as an adjective--much like a person might focus on what "jumbo" means in deciding whether a peanut is in fact a jumbo peanut.

 

[untermensche]

So, I was eating some jumbo peanuts (and they were large, salty, hot, and yummy too, I might add) and started thinking about this thread. Yep, there I was, driving along, eating, thinking, and throwing shells out (and wondering why cars get closer when the inadvertent shells hit them.) But anyhow, not every peanut was jumbo in size. Some were smaller (well, a few were anyhow), but they were all jumbo peanuts--came from the same strain.

The confusion between a logical possibility and a logical possibility is the same kind of confusion that is found between a jumbo peanut and a jumbo peanut. Wait, huh, what? The new strain of peanut that produces unusually large peanuts and shells needed to be named. We could have named it Strain 78. Had we done so, no one would argue that the smaller peanuts in the yield are not from Strain 78.

Untermensche's refusal to accept that "Santa exists is a logical possibility"has more to do with the name. I can envision him arguing that the runt size peanuts are not jumbo peanuts. That's the danger of treating single two-worded terms as two single-worded terms.

Yes, "jumbo" was used to name the new strain. Why not, most from the strain were jumbo in size. But the description wasn't perfect because it failed to account for the smaller peanuts from the strain? Names aren't perfect.

To discuss a possibility that isn't logical (whatever that might mean) should not be misconstrued with discussing a possibility that is logical (whatever that might mean). Call that A and B.

When we discuss whether something is a logical possibility (C) (something wholly different than B), we don't concern ourselves with the things Untermensche brings up, and that's because he insists on focusing on what "logical" means, as if it's to be used as an adjective--much like a person might focus on what "jumbo" means in deciding whether a peanut is in fact a jumbo peanut.

I don't see the argument?

Do peanuts logically exist?

Is it logically possible that peanuts of various sizes exist?

Who said all you had was jumbo peanuts? Me?

Does Santa Clause logically exist?

If so where might he possibly exist?

 

[beero1000]

I do not bail on you. I have responded to you many many times.

And I respond seriously if the argument is serious.

You have not shown me how infinity differs from the Easter Bunny.

One is an imaginary concept about some series going on without end and the other makes children happy.

Do you think you could chop something real up infinitely?

Suppose you chop up the movement of some object infinitely and the object makes the smallest possible move forward.

How far has it moved?

If you can chop up the movement infinitely, then there is no smallest possible movement, by definition.

He's just completely blind to his question-begging. It's mind-blowing.