Curt Doolittle

Category: Epistemology and Method

  • FUN COINCIDENCE Coursera has a course, starting monday, in Mathematical Philosop

    FUN COINCIDENCE

    Coursera has a course, starting monday, in Mathematical Philosophy addressing precisely the questions I’m asking – Although, from what I gather, it is an example of everything that is I believe is wrong with the discipline of logic. 🙂 “Know thy enemy” and all that sort of thing. Anyway. I thought that it would be fun to take. And to have whole bunch of people and some young professors to bounce ideas off of. I’m pretty sure I understand the domain now. It only took me two weeks I think. But I’m pretty sure that the infinite set problem is a trivial statement about constructing statements, not a meaningful statement about reality.

    Source date (UTC): 2013-07-29 07:28:00 UTC

  • PROPERTARIAN METAPHYSICS (DRAFT / SKETCH: I have to start somewhere) Not “Popper

    PROPERTARIAN METAPHYSICS

    (DRAFT / SKETCH: I have to start somewhere)

    Not “Popperian”. But “Propertarian”. 🙂 I drafted this before writing the reposted-bit that follows. I have to find a way to tie all of this together. So it might take me a few more tries.

    World (1) Monism : That there exists a single objective, physical reality (physicalism). This objective world exists independently of us. Our actions take place in this world. Our process of thinking takes place in this world. However, the experience of thinking does not take place in this world, because experience is our reaction to the changes in state of our perceptions interacting with our memories in real time. The concept of categories and change in state has no meaning without memory to detect that change. The human body exists here. The act of counting and measuring exists here.

    World (2) Cartesian Dualism – Thoughts: The world of our minds that is caused by the change in state of memory by our senses, perceptions, and thoughts. Our minds are fraught with cognitive bias and error, and without testing against the real world (1) the are indistinguishable from dreams. Whatever information exists here exists only as long as the conscious mind of the individual can access and make use of those memories. THE INDIVIDUAL exists here because his memories do. Memories of what PROPERTY an individual OWNS exists here. In fact, we might argue that that is most of what exists here. Our thinking consists of three parts: stimuli whose workings are imperceptible to us, feelings that we react to changes in the state of, or anticipated state of PROPERTY, and the conscious created by changes in he presentation of the world to our senses by a combination of stimuli and memories.

    World (3) Popper’s Third World – External Representation: The world of the conscious construction: artifacts of our minds (formulae, symbols, language, movement of our bodies, writing, formula, arithmetic, mathematics, designs, tools, arts, and complex constructions.) The things that STORE the results of our thoughts. Given the limited ability of our memories to store concrete items, this category of marks, symbols, records, formulae, designs, narratives allows us to remember, compare, calculate, store, retrieve, copy and share ideas with one another. Once information is stored in these symbols, much of it will exist as long as someone exists to make use of it. CONTRACTS exist here.

    World (4) Dastafshan’s Fourth World – Social Consequences: The world of the social construction of reality (unconscious collective concepts, processes and consequences, morals and norms – those things that only exist by social interaction and cooperation – unintended, self-organizing, unconscious rules and ideas that we understand in retrospect but do not intentionally create. ie: ‘gods’ live here. And the principles that determine PROPERTY distributions in any group exist here. 🙂 Without constant use, human action, and interaction between humans, this information will cease to exist.

    Note that Ali Dastafshan’s Fourth World isn’t part of common philosophical discourse. And I am not necessarily framing the fourth world as he would have me do, but perhaps as E.O. Wilson would. But, I think this definition is in terms more likely to be understood by those of us with exposure to analytical philosophy.

    CONTRA METAPHYSICAL LANGUAGE

    Now, how do I convert these categories into operational language?

    Unfortunately, the only efficient way of expressing philosophical ideas as necessities is to structure them as syllogisms as the greeks did, or as riddles – as Lao Tsu was a master of.

    The only way to express scientific statements is through operational language. Because correlation between actions and facts, and therefore between theory and actions that determine facts, is the test of operational language. Without which causal relations are indeterminate.

    The only way to express human actions as necessary is praxeologically. Because the equivalent of logical non contradiction is the test of rational incentives.

    Unfortunately, instead of a necessary test, praxeology was proposed as a system of apodeictic certainty from which deductions could likewise be certain.

    There are two problems with that approach. The fist is the problem that plagues any logical system, which is that such certainty requires completeness. The second is the completeness is impossible. The impossibility of completeness is what causes the apparent paradoxes in mathematics and the first order logic of set theory.

    The problem that causes a separation of mathematics and logic from science in socio-economics occurs largely due to the use of symbolic proxies without accompanying statements that are articulated in praxeological or operational language: there is a very great difference between “given a set … “, and describing how to create a set of anything, including linguistic permutations.

    As for absurdities of logic, assuming a finite universe, or even an actionably finite universe, any category we name thereby defines the remainder. Any set diminishes the remainder. And all contradictions are tautologies.

    For these reasons science has displaced both philosophy and logic. It has not displaced mathematics, because math can be used in the context of natural science and therefore externally constrained by context.

    Likewise the only way to externally bind logic and philosophy to reality is to require use of operational language.

    And the operational language of human action is constructed through praxeological expression. Praxeology exposes all statements to sympathetic testing. Without praxeological expression any statement is platonic: not real.

    Source date (UTC): 2013-07-29 07:05:00 UTC

  • Unfortunately, the only efficient way of expressing philosophical ideas as neces

    Unfortunately, the only efficient way of expressing philosophical ideas as necessities is to structure them as syllogisms as the greeks did, or as riddles – as Lao Tsu was a master of.

    The only way to express scientific statements is through operational language. Because correlation between actions and facts, and therefore between theory and actions that determine facts, is the test of operational language. Without which causal relations are indeterminate.

    The only way to express human actions as necessary is praxeologically. Because the equivalent of logical non contradiction is the test of rational incentives.

    Unfortunately, instead of a necessary test, praxeology was proposed as a system of apodeictic certainty from which deductions could likewise be certain.

    There are two problems with that approach. The fist is the problem that plagues any logical system, which is that such certainty requires completeness. The second is the completeness is impossible. The impossibility of completeness is what causes the apparent paradoxes in mathematics and the first order logic of set theory.

    The problem that causes a separation of mathematics and logic from science in socio-economics occurs largely due to the use of symbolic proxies without accompanying statements that are articulated in praxeological or operational language: there is a very great difference between “given a set … “, and describing how to create a set of anything, including linguistic permutations.

    As for absurdities of logic, assuming a finite universe, or even an actionably finite universe, any category we name thereby defines the remainder. Any set diminishes the remainder. And all contradictions are tautologies.

    For these reasons science has displaced both philosophy and logic. It has not displaced mathematics, because math can be used in the context of natural science and therefore externally constrained by context.

    Likewise the only way to externally bind logic and philosophy to reality is to require use of operational language.

    And the operational language of human action is constructed through praxeological expression. Praxeology exposes all statements to sympathetic testing. Without praxeological expression any statement is platonic: not real.

    Source date (UTC): 2013-07-28 10:02:00 UTC

  • FOR REASON NOT RECOGNITION I’m going to add this to my Quora signature because i

    http://www.propertarianism.com/tools-and-techniques-for-political-debate/a-list-of-terms-for-use-in-evaluating-political-debate/CAPTCHA FOR REASON NOT RECOGNITION

    I’m going to add this to my Quora signature because it seems like I use it in every debate:

    “**So, you mean that you don’t understand, and can’t formulate an objection, so you will retreat into your ignorance, because you are operating on belief and not reason. Right?***”

    Quora WAS interesting. But it’s degrading into just another Yahoo Forums / Internet Newsgroups. The useful thing about wikipedia is that the damned syntax prohibits casual editing by idiots.

    We use CAPTCHA for proving you’re human. It’s a trivial Turing Test for recognizing letters and numbers. But to improve debate, we need an equivalent system to test not for RECOGNITION but for REASON.

    I have to think about that a bit. Is there a way to generate random syllogisms that distinguish between sentimental, allegorical, normative (moral), historical, empirical, rational and ratio-empirical?

    Just think of the value that would add to online arguments. 🙂 Or rather, the value it would have in reducing online arguments. 🙂

    See my categorization of arguments here:

    http://www.propertarianism.com/tools-and-techniques-for-political-debate/a-list-of-terms-for-use-in-evaluating-political-debate/#I

    Source date (UTC): 2013-07-28 05:00:00 UTC

  • PROPERTARIANISM Status First daft of epistemology has been done for months. Fini

    PROPERTARIANISM

    Status

    First daft of epistemology has been done for months.

    Finished first sketch of metaphysics today.

    Still having trouble with the necessity of Calculation in the broader sense.

    Ready to put this section to paper soon. Get rid of axiom of action language and handle it as necessary for operational language.

    In Propertarian context this material is just back matter but it takes trivial criticism off the table if its included. I don’t have to handle silly objections.

    Source date (UTC): 2013-07-26 16:13:00 UTC

  • What Are Some Problems People Will Be Surprised Mathematics Can’t Solve?

    I am not sure that there are problems mathematics cannot illustrate.  That seems unlikely.  I think there are LOGICAL problems with number theory that cannot necessarily be solved with certainty.  Math is  a pretty good way of describing the physical world.  It is a pretty good way of describing complex relations.  But that is different from saying that math can express everything about itself.  And that is probably the fundamental question that we would like to solve, but may not be able to.

    Jack Thompson below, asks the metaphysical question whether real numbers exist, and the answer is one of definitions not of existence.  No, real numbers are platonic entities. Natural numbers exist in nature.  All else is a product of mind. And even natural numbers are names for the act of counting. Everything else an act of calculating ratios.  🙂

    https://www.quora.com/What-are-some-problems-people-will-be-surprised-mathematics-cant-solve

  • What Are Some Problems People Will Be Surprised Mathematics Can’t Solve?

    I am not sure that there are problems mathematics cannot illustrate.  That seems unlikely.  I think there are LOGICAL problems with number theory that cannot necessarily be solved with certainty.  Math is  a pretty good way of describing the physical world.  It is a pretty good way of describing complex relations.  But that is different from saying that math can express everything about itself.  And that is probably the fundamental question that we would like to solve, but may not be able to.

    Jack Thompson below, asks the metaphysical question whether real numbers exist, and the answer is one of definitions not of existence.  No, real numbers are platonic entities. Natural numbers exist in nature.  All else is a product of mind. And even natural numbers are names for the act of counting. Everything else an act of calculating ratios.  🙂

    https://www.quora.com/What-are-some-problems-people-will-be-surprised-mathematics-cant-solve

  • MORE ON WRITING THEORY : AN ARGUMENT IS A THEORY AND WRITING IT IS A TEST I gues

    MORE ON WRITING THEORY : AN ARGUMENT IS A THEORY AND WRITING IT IS A TEST

    I guess, I should put it this way: I don’t assume I know anything. Anything at all. I just construct arguments to see how well I can make them. They’re like recipes. I bake a hundred variations of the cake. Maybe one of them rises enough to be worthy of frosting. When I run out of ways to write a recipe and the recipe produces a cake all the time, I consider it the best recipe I can make for a cake.

    1) Write to learn what you do not know. (observe and record)

    2) Write to test what you know. (conduct experiments)

    3) Write what you know you know. (articulate hypothesis)

    4) Publish what you have written (subject it to testing by peer review)

    That’s about it. That’s science. I don’t assume I know anything except that which is false. And libraries are largely populated by that which is false. The problem is determining what’s left over that still might be true. 🙂

    If each book held one idea, I’m pretty sure that a library of 1500 books (per both Murray and Adler) would accomplish the task.

    Source date (UTC): 2013-07-25 11:51:00 UTC

  • FINAL WORD ON METHOD: AUSTRIAN AND OTHERWISE Any statement about human behavior

    FINAL WORD ON METHOD: AUSTRIAN AND OTHERWISE

    Any statement about human behavior that cannot be expressed as a sequence of human actions open to subjective, sympathetic, testing of the rationality of the individual’s incentives, is in fact, not scientific.

    The reason we like to use correlative aggregates is that they obscure involuntary transfers. The reason we like to use causal, operational language, that describe human actions, is because it makes visible involuntary transfers.

    And while morality APPEARS to differ around the world, because different cultures use different allocations of property rights between the commons, family, Pater, and individual – because the productive and reproductive strategies must be reflected in a group’s property rights – the fact is that human morality, universally, without exception, is determined by a prohibition on involuntary transfer according to those cultural allocations of property. Period. Morality is property. Period. End of discussion.

    This fact illustrates the difference between progressive (mainstream) economics, and conservative (austrian) economics, Progressives want to hide and conservatives want to draw attention to, involuntary transfers. And the reason is that Progressives favor the feminine reproductive strategy of limitless population growth that all other non-sentient creatures demonstrate. And conservatives favor improvement of the tribe in relation to other tribes – which is something only humans do with intent.

    Everything else is just propaganda.

    Apodeictic nonsense included.

    Philosophy is justifying your preferred reproductive strategy and nothing else. The fact that we use language and reason is arbitrary. We are just like any other species, using what is available to us to reproduce. We’e just invented a very complex verbal dance. But its still a dance.

    And that’s all our nonsense is : a dance.

    Source date (UTC): 2013-07-24 06:09:00 UTC

  • THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN SCIENCE AND THE AUSTRIAN METHOD Science is useful in tw

    THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN SCIENCE AND THE AUSTRIAN METHOD

    Science is useful in two dimensions: X) It allows us to sense what we cannot sense – by making the unobservable, observable by reducing those phenomenon to some form of analogy to experience. And Y) It helps us compensate for the unfortunate strength of our cognitive biases.

    The Austrian method asks us to use one of the methods of science, by describing any human behavior in OPERATIONAL LANGUAGE (in terms of human actions) and to SYMPATHIZE with each of those steps, and when in sympathy, to TEST whether each step meets the test of rational incentives. If it doesn’t there are two possible answers: the first being that ‘humans won’t do that, so that can’t be true’, and the second being ‘humans might do that but this will be the external consequence of it’.

    I don’t think there is any mystery to the Austrian method: it is another scientific process that allows us to test by sympathetic experiences, whether any give statement can be constructed as steps of human action, and where each step is subject to the scrutiny and test of rational incentives.

    Using the methods of science we reduce phenomenon to something we can experience, and test. I don’t like that we describe these processes as apodictically certain. But it is irrational to state that I can use science to reduce something beyond experience to experience, so that I can interpret it, but on the other hand, suggest that sympathetic interpretation of incentives is less ‘scientific’. It’s just as scientific as anything else, because human cognitive biases are reasonably universal, and need to be INCLUDED in any such analysis of human behavior – not excluded from it. That’s not logical either.

    I apologize to other Austrians for using somewhat different language, but there is a method to my madness: in trying to articulate what it is that we are doing in this particular way I hope to correct praxeology as Mises stated it and Rothbard, well, ruined it – if not in theory but in practice, as those ideas have spread with common use.

    Most of us in our field tend to contrast empirical evidence with tests of Austrian rationality. I think this is what separates us from other fields. We do not make deductions without bounding them by the theory of rational incentives. We are skeptical of everything. In particular, we have internalized as a scientific principle, the concept that hubris and cognitive bias are ever present challenges to our interpretations.

    Source date (UTC): 2013-07-23 14:17:00 UTC