SilasBarta comments on Rationality Quotes August 2011 - Less Wrong

3 Post author: dvasya 02 August 2011 08:24PM

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Comment author: SilasBarta 03 August 2011 02:27:52AM *  17 points [-]

About the intersection of math and politics through the mind of a child, Bob Murphy relates this story about his six-year-old son Clark:

Clark: Daddy why can’t there be a biggest number?

Bob: Because no matter how big a number is, there is always a bigger number.

Clark (puzzled): Why?

Bob: OK, let’s say a guy comes up to me and says, “Hey, I know the biggest number!” Then I would say, “Oh yeah, what is it?” And the guy would tell me, “It’s a billion billion.” But then I would just add 1 to it, and say, “A ha, a billion billion and 1 is a bigger number. So you made a mistake when you said you thought of the biggest number.”

Clark (after a pause): What guy are you talking about?

Bob: Just any guy. I’m saying, if anybody tries to think of the biggest number, I’ll always be able to do that trick–where I add 1 to it–so they can’t do it. They’ll always lose.

Clark: What if a girl asks you?

[I ran through the same thing with a girl asking me...]

Clark: OK I want to tell the story!

Bob: Sure go ahead.

Clark: So what if a guy came up to me and said, “Hey Clark, I know the biggest number! It’s 100 billion!” Then I would say, “No, 100 billion and 1 is bigger! You’re wrong!”

Bob: Right, good job. So he didn’t really think of the biggest number after all, did he?

Clark: No.

Bob: And you can always do that.

Clark: OK let me tell it again with Sam [name possibly changed--a kid from his class].

Bob: OK.

Clark: So what if Sam came up to me and said, “Hey Clark, I know the biggest number. It’s 50 googol.” But I would say, “No Sam you’re wrong! 50 googol and 1 is bigger!” But Sam gets mad so he would start shouting and say, “I DID TOO THINK OF THE BIGGEST NUMBER CLARK!!”

And I know we're not supposed to quote ourselves, but you rarely get an opportunity to use a line like this:

I guess you already tried explaining to Clark that the cardinality of the natural numbers is invariant under transformations of largest number proponent?