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army1987 comments on Rationality: Appreciating Cognitive Algorithms - Less Wrong
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I'd say “sky” is a relative concept and depends on where you are. If I was on the mountainside and had clouds below me, I still wouldn't say I'm in the sky. (But I would if I was on a plane, so it's not as simple as “anything that's above me”.)
And I'm on the ground right now. There doesn't seem to be any clouds above me, but if there were, they'd be in the sky, and the sky would have white splotches.
I consider anything that is contiguously attached to the planet (or moon) which I am currently on (e.g. a man on a mountaintop), or less than about two metres from the ground (e.g. a man jumping up and down) to not be in the sky. Anything further than that from ground surface, and either currently ascending or able to maintain that altitude, counts as 'in the sky'; anything further than that from ground surface and not able to maintain that altitude, counts as 'falling from the sky'.
If I jump out of a second-floor window, I'm certainly falling, but I'm hardly falling from the sky.
The building is contiguously attached to the ground (unless it's some sort of flying building). You need to be more than two metres away from it and falling to count as 'falling from the sky'.
For safety reasons, it's probably also better to throw an object - I'd suggest a tennis ball - if you actually want to perform an experiment. You could get it to the state 'falling from the sky' by throwing it hard enough horizontally from a fourth- or fifth-floor window, or dropping it off a bridge.
Hmmm... I may need to update my definition to consider the 'dropped-from-a-bridge' case.
I'd say that it has to be far enough from the ground that you wouldn't notice the parallax effect if you walked around below it, it has to be above the horizon. Also, it can't be an airplane or something. I'm not sure why exactly that last rule is there, given that meteors and such count. Maybe most people would consider it part of the sky. I'd say it's in the sky, but not part of it.