SUO: Re: Dominant In Their Own Mind Philosophers (DITOMP's)
o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o
Chris,
That was just one of those weakend excursions, and I've got
more compelling work to do right now, so I'll leave it on the
back burner till next weekend. The only truly substantive topic
that I see on first scan is the issue of formal equivalence versus
practical inequivalence, but we've discussed that before and I did
not get the sense that you were very sensitive to the significance
of such hum-drum concerns as computational complexity and actually
having tools that work in practice. But maybe that was then.
Later ...
Jon
o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o
Chris Menzel wrote:
>
> On Sun, Jun 22, 2003 at 09:44:46PM -0400, Jon Awbrey wrote:
> > Chris Menzel wrote:
> > >
> > > On Sun, Jun 22, 2003 at 03:02:25PM -0400, Jon Awbrey wrote:
> > > > John,
> > > >
> > > > Welcome to the club of idiosyntactic thinkers.
> > >
> > > I'm sure John will be thrilled at the implication that he is a
> > > fellow pea in your pod.
> >
> > Oh, I should have warned you, that was supposed to be ironical. After
> > all, when things as utterly standard in mathematics as category
> > theory, differential calculus, and definition up to isomorphism are
> > still received as illegimate novelties by the received view in FO
> > logic, then how could any humble practitioner of the dark arts and
> > light crafts of math hope to have his or her terminolgical sine qua
> > nons received as anything but idiosyntactic by the
> > received-in-their-own-mind monadic viewers?
>
> As usual, contentless wordplay, though at least there's a hint of an
> argument here for a change; unfortunately, like your subject heading,
> it's an ad hominem, and not even a good one -- category theory, calculus,
> and def up to isomorphism illegitimate novelties to practitioners of
> standard FOL? Category theory is a standard tool in more advanced math
> logic, and notions of iso/homomorphism are fundamental to elementary
> first-order model theory (to wit: elementary embedding, categoricity,
> etc). As for your inclusion of the calculus in this fantasy list, well,
> one scarecely knows how to respond. Do you also accuse practitioners of
> the "received" view in physics of counting, say, electrical engineering,
> as an illegitimate novelty? It would be about as bizarre.
>
> But why do I care? Because the bulk of your posts do not seem to me to
> represent any move toward progress. They are either just pointless
> Xerox's from some easily accessible text, or repackaged
> propositional/predicate logic, or well-known first-order theories,
> gussied up in quirky new duds -- yet always with that hint that you're
> up to something deep and revolutionary. Well, maybe you are, but if so
> its depth and novelty are on some philosophical plane that seems to me
> far removed from the inevitably messy engineering task at hand.
> Interesting and important as it might be on that plane, it strikes me as
> an impediment on this one that will never get the group any closer to
> formulating usable axioms for, say, "event".
>
> > > While there are indeed distinctively idiosyncratic elements to
> > > John's approach, unlike you:
> > >
> > > * He provides genuine, well-informed arguments when he fulminates
> > > against received views in logic;
> > >
> > > * He provides genuine arguments for the advantages of the
> > > distinctive elements of his approach;
> > >
> > > * He goes to considerable lengths to show exactly the formal
> > > equivalence of his approach to more familiar frameworks.
> >
> > The nice thing about being blessed with the received view in logic, of
> > course, is that one does not have to give any arguments.
>
> Ah yes, now we trot out the usual postmodern whinge about the hegemony
> of dominant knowledge/power structures, too blinkered by their received
> dogma to think their way out of the box, and anyway too interested in
> the preservation of own interests to allow some upstart to raise a
> significant challenge to their authority, reason be damned! And, in
> good postmodern fashion, nary an argument to be found. Your implication
> is particularly ironic in light of the fact that you yourself are just
> repackaging the "received" view. If not, it might be useful if you'd
> say exactly what the received view is and which elements of it you
> reject. (I recall a recent gesture in this direction, to which I
> responded, and to which you never replied -- not that I really want to
> debate those issues.) I presume you intend to keep all the usual
> logical principles, that you don't abandon, e.g., excluded middle,
> universal quantification, etc. But this is just the point: those
> principles are the real received view, and they live in your approach no
> less than its more familiar guises.
>
> But, look, I've said my piece. There doesn't seem to be any strong
> groundswell that you tone down your annoying and pointless wordplay or
> move your series of tutorials back over to the Ontology list where, in
> my view, they belong, and I'm no net cop. No more from me on this.
>
> -chris
o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o