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TsviBT comments on Proofs, Implications, and Models - Less Wrong
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Comments (209)
Ok, fair enough. My philosophy professors were the logically-rudest adults I've spoken to. Actually, that's not even true. Rather, my philosophy professors were the people I most hoped would have less than the standard rudeness, but did not at all.
An anecdote: spring quarter last year, I tried to convince my philosophy professor that logic preserves certainty, but that we could (probably) never be absolutely certain that we had witnessed a correct derivation. He dodged, and instead sermonized about the history of logic. At one point I mentioned GEB, and he said, I quote, "Hofstadter is something of a one trick pony". Here, "one trick" refers to "self-reference". I was too flabbergasted to respond politely.
Or tried to tell you something you didn't get.
From the description TsviBT gives it is far more likely that the professor was stubbornly sermonizing against a strawman.
If TsviBT failed to get something, it is quite likely that from TsviBT 's perspective the professor was waffling pointlessly, and that TsviBTs account would reflect that. We cannot appeal to TsviBT's subjective perspective as proving the objective validity of itself, can we?
I can look at the specific claim TsviBT says he made and evaluate whether it is a true claim or a false claim. It happens to be a true claim.
Assuming you accept the above claim then before questioning whether TsviBT failed to comprehend you must first question whether what TsviBT says he said is what he actually said. It seems unlikely that he is lying about what he said and also not especially likely that he forgot what point he was making---it is something etched firmly in his mind. It is more likely that the professor did not pay sufficient attention to comprehend than it is than that Tsvi did not say what he says he said. The former occurs far more frequently than I would prefer.
Edit:
Is it? I think it's a bit misleading. Logic would preserve certainty if there were any certainty. But there probably isnt. Maybe the prof was trying to make that point.
No, that isn;t the issue. TsviBT only offered a subjective reaction to the professor's words, not the words themselves. We cannot judge from that whether the professor was rudely missing his birlliant point, or making an even more birlliant riposte, the subteleties of which passed TsviBT by.
I disagree regarding the accuracy of the claim as stated (you seem to be making the mistake a professor may carelessly make by considering a different more trivial point). I also disagree that the alleged "brilliant riposte" could be 'brilliant' as more than an effective social move given that it moved to to a different point (as a riposte to the claim and not just an appropriate subject change) rather than acknowledging the rather simple technical correction.
You are giving the professor the benefit of doubt that can not exist without TsviBT's claim of what he personally said being outright false.
We don;t know that the riposte moved to a differnt point because we weren;t there and do not have the profs words.
It did one of moving to a different point, agreeing with TsviBT or being outright incorrect. (Again following your assumption that it was, in fact, a riposte.) Moving to a different point is the most likely (and most generous) assumption.
(I have expressed my point as much as I ought and most likely then some. It would be best for me to stop.)
TsviBT 's point was not outright correct,, which leads to further options such as expounding on a subtle error.
I hope that means you refrain from responding at all. You can't fix broken high status people!
Wait. Oh bother. I try to do that all the time. But I at least tend to direct my efforts towards influencing the social environment such that the incentives for securing said status further are changed so that on the margin the behavior of the high-status people (including, at times, logical rudeness) is somewhat altered. "Persuasion" of a kind.
Name three ways of you performing said persuasion.
No. Not at this time. (I would prefer to be not believed than to give examples of this right now.)
Actually it was more on the line of "give me practical examples so I can extrapolate the rule better than from an abstract summary", but, sure, suit yourself.
To be fair to the professor, conflating deductive and inductive reasoning is a basic error that's easy to pattern match.
To be fair to TsviBT it is pattern matching to the nearest possible stupid thing that is perhaps the most annoying logical rude tactics there is (whether employed deliberately or instinctively according to social drives).
This does seem correct as stated. I wonder if he deliberately avoided the point to save face regarding a previous error or, as Tim suggested, pattern matched to something different.
Now that is far less surprising and on average I can agree there (although I personally had exceptions!) It was the absolute scale that I perhaps questioned.
To be fair, Hoftstadter is basically a one-trick pony, in that he published one academically-relevant book and then more or less jumped straight to Professor Emeritus in all but name, publishing very little and interacting with academia even less.
Just wishing I had read GEB sooner. Reading it now and it seems to be getting ruined by politics.
Politics? I don't understand how.
Also, above comment should in no way be taken as criticism of GEB. It's great. It's just that that's pretty much all he has to his credit.
I mean people want to tear chunks out of it for status reasons... ...I think.