randallsquared comments on Supernatural Math - Less Wrong

1 Post author: saturn 19 May 2009 11:31AM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Comments (56)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: randallsquared 19 May 2009 09:08:08PM 3 points [-]

No, I'm not holding that there actually is such a world, only that there would be no reason to apply our reality's rules to such a world. My real point is that the logical follows in actual historical fact from the physical, rather than being some sort of special knowledge that can be deduced without reference to anything physical.

Comment author: JGWeissman 19 May 2009 09:23:41PM 2 points [-]

My real point is that the logical follows in actual historical fact from the physical

Really, our beliefs about the logical follow from the physical. Don't confuse the map with the territory.

Comment author: Jack 19 May 2009 10:01:00PM 2 points [-]

Heh. This is precisely the question, isn't it? Are logic and mathematics in the territory somewhere or are they the language of the map?

Comment author: JGWeissman 19 May 2009 10:20:03PM 0 points [-]

The way I see it is that logic is a territory, my beliefs about logic form a corresponding map, and that map is useful for constructing maps of other territories (and the accuracy of those maps is evidence of the accuracy of the logic map).

Comment author: Jack 19 May 2009 10:28:59PM 0 points [-]

My real point is that the logical follows in actual historical fact from the physical, rather than being some sort of special knowledge that can be deduced without reference to anything physical.

If nothing else this is a really well phrased statement of position. Maybe I'm just committing the philosopher's fallacy (deciding things are necessary because I'm not creative enough to think up alternatives) but I really just can't see what it would mean for there to be a world in which A didn't = A, in which the middle wasn't excluded, in which triangles are round, etc. What criteria are you using to decide on one view over the other?