At any rate it apparently allows you to defend platonism to some extent.
I didn't see myself as defending platonism, so much as defending a certain kind of existence-talk that I, along with the platonists, think is legitimate. I agree with them that one should be able to consider the possibility that a largest pair of twin primes exists. Furthermore, it should be possible to do this without having a formal procedure for deciding the question in mind, even implicitly.
Yes, but then I could broaden my shooting definition slightly and say "At one time it was possible to shoot this species."; in other words I would give the past empirie that convinced me of the species' existence. Or alternatively, I could go for "in principle" and say that we just need some closed timelike curvies, or other means of extending the lightcone.
Couldn't an empirically well-supported theory give high probability to the claim that there exists a species X whose future and past lightcones never intersect yours, and which is not accessible to you by any closed timelike curves or other means of extending the lightcone?
And besides, wouldn't it be kind of weird if your ability to use the word "exists" were constrained by how sophisticated your physics is? It would seem to follow that someone who believes in a classical Newtonian universe allowing arbitrarily fast travel can legitimately ponder the possibility that dragons exist 10^100 light years away, while you cannot because you (let's say) believe in a universe in which it is and was always impossible for you to interact causally with anything that far away.
I didn't see myself as defending platonism, so much as defending a certain kind of existence-talk that I, along with the platonists, think is legitimate.
Ok, but here is your original reply:
The platonist might reply: If the number 2 didn't exist in the platonic sense, then one implication would be that you would be unable to construct proofs of that number's existence within the formal systems that you're thinking of.
And all your replies since have taken the form "the platonist might say". Can I suggest that you should defend the theory you...
I recognize the title could be more informative. At the same time I believe it says what is important.
I believe in a deity, I believe in mathematical entities in the same way.
The community of LessWrong (from whenceforth: LessWrong) is deeply interesting to me, appearing as a semi-organized atheist, reductionist community.
LessWrong seems very interested in promoting rationality, which I applaud. The effort does seem scattered, though, and this is the reason I post.
One has Eliezer's website with some interesting posts. The same of this community. The community links to some posts when you are coming for the first time into it, and you also have a filter for top posts. One has the blog. And recently, the center for modern rationality (in the same page as harrypoter fanfiction about rationality).
The point being there is no defined roadmap to go from AIC (average irrational chump to make an analogy to Game - which also seems to come up around quite a bit) to RA (again, rationality artist).
I write this post as to maybe generate a discussion on how the efforts could be concentrated and a new direction taken.
Should the creation of the Center for Modern Rationality envision this same concentration, this post may and should be disregard.
If it does not, then I leave it to your consideration.
Hang.