wedrifid comments on If we live in a simulation, what does that imply? - Less Wrong
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
Comments (59)
The 'some' is fine and if the replacement with symbols was intended as a correction rather than a denial then it would be fine. However, when writing complete sentence replies to others speaking English philosophers still use plurals correctly.
A philosopher could correctly write "Wedrifid is just some human" but is unlikely to write "Wedrifid is just some "humans". Suppose that there happens to be a subculture (philosophy or otherwise) where it is conventional to write "humans" where English only permits the singular. Even then, when making a retort to a user speaking the colloquial form it would be required to include some reference to the language variant. In the same way when someone goes around declaring "Carbon is a metal!" to a general audience it is necessary to include something like "in the astronomical sense".
I may be shooting an allied soldier here but as it stands this is a valid argument but this was not a valid argument. It was a misleading response to the preceeding comment, regardless of how flawed that comment may have been.