Agent Smith

I've heard that too. Truly random, in my book, means the absence of a pattern. Ramsey Theory Now according to Ramsely theory there's a pattern in thes...

Yep, the question then is what is intelligence? It can't be acting in ways to maximize returns, minimize losses - even unthinking nature does that wit...

:ok: K. T. Fann it is then.

https://youtu.be/O-4ithG_07Q

Do we know our body (a technological marvel if you really think about it) well enough? I don't think so and yet we (ab/mis)use it. The same goes for g...

The only time violence is condoned is when people who resort to it do so out of desperation. What is necessary can neither be good nor evil.

Why isn't it unreasonable? Do you mean everything is reasonable?

:up: And... You mentioned the 2nd law of thermodynamics It's just a vague idea of mine. I'm glad that it made sense ro you, assuming you weren't being...

:ok: I was hoping to read his original works.

:up:

The tip of the iceberg. A small portion of a much larger corpus of knowledge.

Free will, as we all know, is central to ethics. Does ethics make scientific/mathematical sense? The 2nd law of thermodynamics (entropy) implies that ...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VC5TJfZ4_EY Will \rightarrow

There has to be more to it than just that. Good hypothesis though! :up:

All I can say is human beings seem to violate some mathematical principle reducible to linearity (straigth lines). Physics, chemistry don't (every phy...

:lol:

I don't get it. I once heard Neil deGrasse Tyson (astrophysicist, science educator, author) say that the total amount of energy in the universe is 0. ...

Explains why some states treat abstentions as a form of protest; a few minor adjustments here and there and those who refuse to cast their ballot are ...

:clap: Made me think of Jesus. Being God, had he stayed cold and dead in his sepulchre, it would've been an even greater mircale. What's a simple resu...

Covid doesn't want to exist. It's not mutating deliberately. It's all chance. (Viral) DNA is inherently unstable and so variants are no cause for wond...

Value: 1. Intrinsic value only :sad: 2. Instrumental value only :smile: 3. Intrinsic + Instrumental value :chin:

Simple reason: You're gonna havta pay for him/her, willingly (taxes) or unwillingly (robbery). Why not just voluntarily pay him/her? You get brownie p...

:clap: A well-considered gem of wisdom!

:ok: I'll have to read his books! Damn it! I thought I'd leave the heavy lifting to others.

You never know. :grin:

SETI is one of those organizations that'll never show results. An alien signal would throw open the doors to new technology, something the government ...

Even when there are no compelling reasons (e.g. a soccer match, a man with a loaded gun) to take a nonlinear path, we can and do.

As I told you, Wittgenstein never made any sense to me. I don't know why. I can't seem to fathom how words could mean anything if not that they refer ...

:ok: It's amazing how vast math is; the same goes for other disciplines too I suppose. There's absolutely no hope for a generalist these days. G'day.

:up: :ok: How about if I put it this way: From sleep, it's possible to wake up but from death, there's no such thing as life.

I would expect a mathematical system to exhibit behavior in line with mathematical principles one of which is always take the shortest distance betwee...

Way above my pay grade, jgill. Catastrophe theory, from what I could grasp from the Wikipedia entry, is facing strong opposition from some quarters re...

:grin: Why? If God doesn't exist, anything is permissible and that being so, justice is moot. I'm agreeing with you!

I'm the soul of futility, Sisyphus' avatar.

:chin: Never mind!

Damned if you do, damned if you don't! Twisted! I thought I was the only cynic around here. A distinction sans a difference. . I'm talking about lip s...

Camus-Kant Riddle of Value Kant was adamant that people should be considered as ends in themselves, never as means i.e. loosely speaking, a (human) li...

I hope so.

The media is flooded with reports of the new Covid-19 variant Omicron. Experts have been unanimous in declaring this new version of the contagion as, ...

When someone goes to bed, he expects to wake up. A far cry from death from which no recoveries have been documented (pace Christianity, Christ's resur...

As far as I know, Words, that includes "omniscience" and "coherence" 1. Can have meaning in the usual sense (as referents). Which meanings of this str...

I don't quite get what you're saying. How do we find out a proposition is true? Anything we say is a method falls under the rubric of justification.

Should I be saying "exactly"!?

:fear: Auto-da-fé. Talk is cheap...better that it come to blows than waste your breath. :grin: I first thought that, supposing those like you are corr...

One thing's for sure, the brains of humanity (mathematicians) equate complex deterministic systems with chaos. They shouldn't do that, it misleads lay...

:grin: Skeptic mode, eh?

Maybe Socrates wanted to send a message - exercise caution - and if it meant resorting to hyperbole, so be it!

One of the biggest problems we face is self-proclaimed infallible authorities. The skeptic tends not to recognize such entities, being informed that m...

I'm sorry I couldn't parse that. You mean to say Skeptic: Someone who knows something and acts like he knows something Ignoramus: Someone who knows no...

I understand quantum uncertainty is an aspect of nature i.e. there are no hidden variables that, if found, will render the quantum world (as) determin...