= 27d567bc2d48d9f40e9ccc20ea370b15)
MugaSofer comments on By Which It May Be Judged - Less Wrong
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
= 783df68a0f980790206b9ea87794c5b6)
Loading…= b715d02e85f7b3b4ae65ca3d3e450868)
Subscribe to RSS Feed
Powered by Reddit
= f037147d6e6c911a85753b9abdedda8d)
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
Comments (934)
You can know about things without observing them? Excellent! I could do with a map of New York, you see, but I'm much too busy to go there and draw one...
</sarcasm>
Seriously, though, you may have misunderstood a part of this conversation.
Yes, I recommend looking into the novel new divination techniques "Physics" and "Mathematics". The former allows one to form a tolerably accurate model of the present based on knowledge of precursor states. The latter allows reasoning about the logical implications of assumed axioms.
Which brings us to the third mystic divination art: Google it.
Next time, try opening with that.
Instead consider that disagreement with a particular claim of yours does not, in fact, imply that I support your opponent's position. In fact, it doesn't imply that I care about the rest of the conversation at all. The particular claim about what can and cannot be known about a proof without seeing (or actually deriving) said proof is the only part remotely interesting. It is intuitive but likely to be false.
Wait ... are you suggesting, say, I could predict the elegance of a proof without observing it, perhaps by my awareness that it was formulated by someone who values elegance, for example.
Well, I can't argue with that. Of course, it is somewhat irrelevant to this discussion, but ... fair enough, I suppose. Quibble accepted.
The amended version: "You can't know that a proof is elegant until someone sees it. "
Sorry, that doesn't capture it either. You can prove all sorts of things about a proof that nobody's found yet, without actually finding the proof yet. It would not be terribly surprising if elegance was one of those things.
Oh. OK.
You're absolutely right. I hadn't thought of that. Point, I guess.
Thanks thomblake, this was what I was getting at. It is likely to be possible to prove some things such as "There exists of proof of X that is below complexity measure Y" while also knowing "X is perceived by the relevant audience to have complexity of at least Z". That could be the kind of information that allows us to expect that the proof will be perceived as "elegant".
If I am remembered for anything, it will be for elucidating the words of wiser men.
On a tangential note, is there a word I could have used above instead of "men" that would preserve the flow but is gender-neutral? I couldn't find one. Ideally one falling syllable.
ETA: The target word should probably end in a nasal or approximate consonant, or else a vowel.
'Minds'? 'Tongues'?
"Minds" is pretty good, and I also like "souls", but "wiser" seems like the wrong adjective in both cases and the ending fricative is less pleasant. Still, I think I'll use one of those in the future when formulating such statements. Thanks!
Were I writing it, I would likely go with "it will be for elucidating the words of those wiser than I."
But if you insist on the structure, perhaps "folk"?
The correct pronoun to use, if you insist, is "those wiser than me" (or "those wiser than I am"). Normally I wouldn't be correcting you, but someone who puts an "I" in that sentence probably cares about pronouns.
“Than” governing nominative pronouns it's widely attested, especially in older texts (I think the standard analysis is that there's an implicit verb after it); it's just terribly stilted those days.
Thank you.
Or "ones".
Thanks - "folk" technically fits the requirements, but totally changes the feel. I'm not sure you can say "folk" and still sound solemn. And I'm not a fan of the hard ending consonant. You're definitely casting a wider net than I was though, and I now imagine there's something to be found.
For me, Berrypick6's suggestion of "minds" has the denotative formality that you desire. Can't comment on the phonetics.
"Heads"? "...the words of those wiser than me"?
What's wrong with "people" (plural) or "person" (sing.)?
Nothing in denotative expression but a lot in terms of poetic flow and syllable count. Substituting "people" into that context just wouldn't have sounded pretty. In fact it would make the attempt at eloquent elucidation seem contrived and forced---leaving it worse off than if the meaning had just been conveyed unadorned and without an attempt to appear quotable and deep.
I was actually surprised by TheOtherDave's response. My poetic module returned null and I was somehow fairly certain that there just wasn't a word that would fit the requirements.
Yes. With “people” it sounds less like an epitaph and more like a commercial slogan to me. My favourite suggestion so far is MixedNuts'.