rudru47 comments on No One Knows What Science Doesn't Know - Less Wrong

37 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 25 October 2007 11:47PM

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Comment author: rudru47 comment score below threshold [+] (19 children)

Comment author: shminux 21 October 2011 05:40:57PM 5 points [-]

Other than the usual "lurk more", you missed the main point:

Ignorance should not be celebrated

Comment author: wedrifid 21 October 2011 05:51:04PM 2 points [-]

This sounds like a spambot. But I can't work out why there are no links embedded.

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 21 October 2011 06:09:00PM 1 point [-]

I've seen spam without links in other places. I have no idea why it exists.

Comment author: dlthomas 21 October 2011 07:24:32PM 4 points [-]

Attempting to mis-train spam filters so that other things get through, is the theory.

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 21 October 2011 09:39:01PM 2 points [-]

Seems surprisingly public-spirited, but maybe some spammers are big enough that it makes sense.

Comment author: dlthomas 21 October 2011 09:51:49PM 1 point [-]

To some degree - although training to your generator seems to make sense.

Comment author: gwern 21 October 2011 06:16:45PM 9 points [-]

I don't think it's a spam-bot. Google the name - it looks like 'rudru47' is an Indian (explaining the malformed syntax) with an interest in the occult, New age, and related matters (explaining the malformed semantics).

Comment author: Bugmaster 21 October 2011 06:17:38PM 5 points [-]

+1 for "malformed semantics". I am totally stealing that phrase.

Comment author: gwern 23 October 2011 01:43:49AM 2 points [-]

Well, once I wrote 'malformed syntax', I had to continue the parallelism and what is the dual to 'syntax'...? It was obvious, really.

Comment author: lessdazed 23 October 2011 09:46:02AM * 2 points [-]

what is the dual to 'syntax'...?

Obvious to me.

Comment author: lessdazed 21 October 2011 05:58:58PM 3 points [-]

I recommend that you read the material on this site and reconsider your list.

But if you ever must post something like it somewhere else, please switch the order of items 4) and 5).

Comment author: RobinZ 22 October 2011 12:36:56AM 2 points [-]

...why switch 4 and 5?

Comment author: lessdazed 22 October 2011 02:28:04AM * 1 point [-]

So that the statements are in order of profundity. That way each has the opportunity to startle. I had no reaction to 5) because I was still recovering from 4). Consider, if the first item on the list was about "the Atomic Flux operating Near the God", would you have had any reaction to "SCIENCE may not be able to know...the phenomena of Soul/consciousness"?

Comment author: pedanterrific 22 October 2011 03:29:06AM 2 points [-]

Now, that's not very nice. rudru47 spelled "know" correctly.

What I like best about 4) is the (presumably unintended) implication that SCIENCE can, in fact, know the depth of the universe.

Comment author: lessdazed 22 October 2011 03:38:37AM 1 point [-]

Spelling fixed.

The idea that something's changing makes it impossible to know is an extreme case of collapsing levels.

Comment author: pedanterrific 22 October 2011 03:54:32AM * 1 point [-]

I know it's pedant(errif)ic of me to point out, but it seems poor epistemic hygiene to let equivocations pass by unremarked:

SCIENCE may not be able to know ... the length and width of Universe, which is ever changing

is a very different claim from

The idea that something's changing makes it impossible to know

For one, the sort of person who places limits on SCIENCE's grasp usually has some mechanism in mind which makes it possible to bypass them (really good drugs, for instance). For two, I don't see any assertion of a causal relationship between the Universe's ever-changingness and SCIENCE's inability to put a tape measure to it. For three, I'm struggling to come up with a way to know the Universe is changing without being able to measure it.

Comment author: lessdazed 22 October 2011 03:58:36AM 0 points [-]

some mechanism in mind which makes it possible bypass them (really good drugs, for instance).

What?

I don't see any assertion of a causal relationship

What if it had read "the length and width of Universe, which is big"?

Comment author: pedanterrific 22 October 2011 04:09:23AM * 3 points [-]

(really good drugs, for instance)

What?

That is, the sort of New Agey people that tend to say "Science can never understand the nature of the soul!" don't mean that the soul can never be understood, just that understanding it requires divine revelation / seeing past the veil of Maya / altered mindstates corresponding suspiciously to the effects of LSD.

What if it had read "the length and width of Universe, which is big"?

Oh, I see - I parsed "Universe, which is ever changing" as a catechistic epithet, a la "Atomic Flux operating Near the God" or "Holy Mary, mother of God". It could be an implication of causality, but it still doesn't seem certain.

Comment author: lessdazed 22 October 2011 04:41:41AM 1 point [-]

people that tend to say "Science can never understand the nature of the soul!" don't mean that the soul can never be understood, just that it understanding it requires divine revelation

Good point. Sometimes they might mean one and other times the other.

rudru47 comments on No One Knows What Science Doesn't Know - Less Wrong

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