Re: (OT) Re: Object identity


Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
On 28 Jun 2006 09:05:36 -0700, David Barrett-Lennard wrote:

Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
On Wed, 28 Jun 2006 13:42:05 GMT, Gabriel Claramunt wrote:

Just a small off-topic comment:
I don't remember any way to make the square root of a negative number a real
number...

Note that your sentence betrays an aversion to wanting to treat numbers
as real in any sense whatsoever. You use words like "concept",
"notion", "abstracted". I suppose you say most numbers don't exist
because no one has written them down. I on the other hand am a
Platonist and don't lose any sleep over this, or force myself to
pollute my sentences with lots of additional but meaningless words to
indicate that numbers aren't real.

I consider that we are doing computer science here, and it is
ultimately a branch of (applied) mathematics. Your aversion to
treating numbers as real strikes me as a sure indicator that you are
lacing your arguments with metaphysical viewpoints that are outside the
scope of computer science.

Read Plato dialogs: you can't make it, you must remember it! (:-))

Plato is also silent about what happens with all things nobody can remember
of, and whether wrong things are real. Can anybody be *really* wrong? (:-))

I remember you said in another post "Platonism is the root of all evil"
(or something like that). What did you mean by that?

I meant wasting time on meaningless questions and in general on philosophy.
Philosophy might be exiting and enjoyable, but it is rather fiction than
science.

Agreed. Although it is surprising how science can push the boundaries.
I'm quite interested in the idea that Quantum Mechanics (with all its
weirdness) can come out of number theory. If physicists develop a self
consistent, computable TOE that passes experimental testing then a
mathematician will say : There exists turing machine T st T is
isomorphic to our universe. That is rather startling for philosophy,
because the mathematician will say that T exists independently of a
postulate of physical reality.

Your 'classification' of objects was an example of such wasting time.

I don't agree. In fact when I was saying "an object must be what it
is" I was actually (without properly realising it) just talking about
the semantics of object identity, the subject of this thread. I'm
slowly learning to formalise the idea better.

Formal systems with self-contradictions allow you to deduce that false
is true.

In platonic sense? (:-))

Therefore you can prove that all statements are both true and
false.

That depends on the axioms:

Yes

1. A V not A
2. not (A & not A) [+/- de Morgan's rules]

And, also, what is A.

That just makes for a rather boring system. Does it exist?
Why not, but who cares.

Above A does. If A exist in platonic sense, then it does in *all* systems.
Or maybe it exists just in some of them, in which you can remember A? I
don't think Plato would agree with that. Anyway, is A true in all systems?
Are all systems same or some of them are more same than others? Which
systems tell truth about A and which don't? Sorry, but it is total rubbish.

All mathematicians are Platonists whether they admit it or not. A good
mathematician only says a thing doesn't exist when a proof is
furnished.

LOL!

I LOL with you.

Cheers,
David Barrett-Lennard

.

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