ThomasDoubts

Just to preface this, I'm not sure, precisely, what Stefan's views are on Martial Arts. A few thoughts did occur to me though, regarding some of the points you posted, attributed to Stef. This is an issue that I have personal experience with, and also one with which I happen to have contrarian (here) tendencies. I started wrestling when I was pretty young; maybe 8. I continued it through my sophomore year of high school. Not that it's important but I was quite good-- culminating in a 3rd place finish in a Tri-State tournament--- Sort of the best of the best in my region. My childhood was very dysfunctional; this is undeniable. I also loved wrestling, in addition to playing Football (US style) and a few non-contact sports. Stefan said that debates are win-win and MA competitions are win-lose I think this is undeniably false. So much so, that I'm skeptical that Stef has said this. I've seen debates that were, in my judgement, lose-lose. Debate is a winning excersize when it reveals truth or conveys useful information, not in and of itself. Hitler and Satan debating who to murder first is not a winning scenario. Catholics and Protestants debating religious doctrine is lose-lose for the debators and anyone who thinks the debate was useful. When two individuals debate and neither gains anything, they've lost time. I don't understand the problem with win-lose. Henry Ford won, Carriage makers lost. I think Martial Arts are unnatural in the sense that I doubt peaceful people in a peaceful society would gain much utility from MA. Maybe they would though, I can't say. I'm glad that wrestling was one of my outlets, and not burning animals alive or something (not that I ever had any desire to do so). I'm glad that I had an outlet where my very natural assertiveness was encouraged, rather than squashed. That confronting and overcoming fear was encouraged, if only fear of physical pain/harm or being powerless. It's about avoiding threatening situations while moving forward. Stefan said that MA is not practise for self-defense, because if two people were just defending themselves then nothing would happen. The world is a dangerous place. Stef likes to say x,y, or z is why we're not still living in caves. If we wanted to avoid harm at all times, we'd never have left the caves, or our mother's vagina, for that matter. People from abusive childhoods are probably more acutely aware of how dangerous a place the world can be. The child raised perfectly peacefully, and protected from the true state of violence in the world are likely to be a bit naive, should they ever stumble upon an bad situation. Such is the price, I think, of their peace. I don't say this because it's somehow a bad thing; better a peaceful person, made victim, than an abuser. The peacefully raised child will have little desire to specialize in physical self defense, but this shouldn't be surprising, even if it is a skill that could be useful to them at some point in time. Contrarily, the abused child sees the world as more violent than it actually is and overcompensates. The peacefully raised child is vulnerable to the black swan. The martial artist has overallocated resources to his self-defense, and probably ought to find a way to monetize his skills in the defense of others. Somebody has to be the bouncer and I'd prefer the martial artist to the sadist. I wonder if Stef would consider Martial Arts sadistic... I think not. Stefan has subjected his daughter to harm, by bringing her into this world; unless he contends she never has, nor will ever be harmed by another in her lifetime. Of course, I mean no offense, but I don't see how this can be refuted. Should one practice handling such a situation? That's a preference. I don't see any problem with people specializing in self-defense, which I'd argue is the primary skill in wrestling, the only MA I have personal experience with. It's practicing putting yourself a situation: You must (choose to? IDK...) move forward; how do you do so while minimizing harm? It comes as no surprise to me at all that most MMA guys, for example, come from abusive backgrounds, and yet they're among the primary types of people in the world I would want witnessing an act of physical aggression against the vulnerable. These people were often raised in abusive environments, and will often move mountains to come to the defense of an innocent victim, while bystanders stand by, clothed in fear or indifference. This is a generalization, obviously, but I think it's valid. Of course, these people are rarely philosophers, but that's not the point. I'd never call a man who flees a coward, but fleeing is a response to fear, survival instinct. I think there are ideas in this world that are worth one good man's life. Whether that's the price required or an inconsequential sacrifice is another matter... Everyone must decide for themselves where their line in sand is, if it exists at all. MA can help provide people with the tools in mind and body to draw a line, if they so choose. Is it the best or ideal way? Nope. Is it useful? Yep. Is it worth pursuing? I don't know that it's not worth it for all people in all places in space and time.

I thought I'd share my experiences over the past 5-6 weeks, if for no other reason than to physically reproduce the things floating around in my head. I prefer typing to pen&paper, so I might as well post it here right? Maybe sharing my experience will be helpful, or at least entertaining to one amongst you. Roundabouts the end of January, I began what I can only describe as a self-imposed sabbatical from FDR, and it has been incredibly and astonishingly and surprisingly beneficial for me. At first glance, this may seem as odd, or as surprising to you, as it was to me, so allow me to explain. If pressed to describe my existence I would say I've been in a serious life-rut/existential crisis for roughly two years now.(complete with the drinking bird desk ornament, a la Megamind) I could write walls of text describing how I came to be where I am, and I'd enjoy it; probably because I've scarcely got another human being who I can meet in reality and with whom I can feel entirely comfortable speaking freely. However, I won't have you suffer or scoff at the idea of reading walls of text. I'll do my best to condense my thoughts....... but, ultimately I'll fail, and you'll still end up with a wall of text. I say I've been in a life-rut---- How so, you might ask. It began with a woman, as these things often do. I gave my heart to a she-devil and she tossed it into a sausage grinder. This was roughly 4 years ago. What has escaped me until recently, was the fact that while I slept, she'd also detached my testicles and chucked them in the same sausage grinder. Yes, it was I, the International Sex Symbol, who lost his mojo, and waged a war (of non-aggression, of course) to regain it. Ok, maybe I'm embellishing a bit with the International Sex Symbol I was born in 1988. I had two parents. I played outside a lot until I had to go to school. After spending 12 years in school, I was told that if I expected to ever amount to anything in this life, I should continue going to school. So I went to college, played the game, and got a dual degree in Econ/Finance. Since graduating in 2011 I have been seriously lacking in the department of purposeful living. During High School and College I built houses for people to live in, in order to have a little spending money. Since graduating college I've held primarily one job (with several part time gigs on the side): sub-contracting for the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority.(DC Metro) If you're reading this from NSA headquarters (incidently, a few miles from my home), I swear I didn't do it. Aaaanyhow, that experience was made up of equal parts: insight and misery. I hope it doesn't offend common sense to say so, but often at work I'd be thinking, "I wonder how different, and how similar, this experience is/would be to living in the USSR, for example. The degree of beaurocracy, and the regulatory environment made the whole experience and operation into a farce of galactic proportions. I was enjoying legislative perogatives that required I be paid roughly double what I could command in a comparable position in private industry. This was great for my wallet and destructive for my conscience-- I hadn't earned that, it was simply taken from someone, and given to me. I had no pride, I was ashamed of what I saw when I looked in the mirror, for this reason, and others. Increasingly, I felt I could no longer continue to act as I had been during the day, and in the evening come home and listen to FDR, or evangalize on behalf of anarchism, or free markets, or whatever. I was nothing but a hipocrite and I couldn't fucking stand it. I don't have the words to describe my hatred for hipocracy, and yet, there it is... Try as I may, no amount of literature, or conversation, or knowledge, or drugs, or masturbation, or entertainment could overcome this simple fact: I was a hipocrite, and I hate hipocracy. Extending, I hated myself. I owned that, though it was plain to me that my hipocracy was learned through the experience of being raised by hipocrites. This came to be my existence. Living my boring and repetitive and hipocritical life, day after day, hating myself for what I was, and hating myself for not doing anything to change it, knowing I had the power within me to do so. So one day, not too long ago, wallowing in my own despair, and pity, and insecurity, and fear, and powerlessness, and hopelessness, I was paid a compliment in passing by an old friend I'd not seen in several years. I'm certain that he hadn't the slightest clue what it meant to me, in fact, it probably wasn't even intended as a compliment; rather he was pointing out how much I had failed in life. What he said was this, "You're one of the smartest people I've ever known. I always thought when we were younger, you'd grow up to do something that was just wicked awesome. I gotta be honest man, I've passed you up, you better catch up." I was really flustered by that, and not sure how to respond. I was in a hurry to do something that, in reality didn't really matter to me at all, but I chatted for a minute or two and we parted ways. I wish I had stood in the street and continued talking to him. Anyhow, that night, I sat thinking about what he'd said for hours. Ya know, here's this guy: an older version of the short, scrawny jewish kid who really liked basketball; who wore Volleyball kneepads when we played on a team together as kids because he was too uncordinated to run without falling on himself; the guy who everybody made fun of in school. And he's just pointed out, what a failure I became. It ran over me like a truck. In an instant, I felt repulsed, thinking, "Who the Fuck are you?!" (referring to myself) You're going to let this guy show you up?! Are you fucking kidding me?! If he could, your 10 year old self, would punch you in the face, and kick you in the nuts, if only to provoke some kind of response, or energy, or courage, or passion, or soooomething... Anything. He'd be ashamed of your lifelessness! (Obviously, who cares about basketball. The point I'm making is that I always felt like I was on top of the world til about my early 20's and I just hit a wall of stagnation, and now I'm watching all of these mere mortals, pass me by) So what did I do? I quit my job the next day, and vowed never to return to FDR until I'd satisfied my need to live out my principals. I'm pleased to say that I have done so. The idea of looking for new job, and doing interviews has always caused me great anxiety, in a way that few things ever have. Fueled by an uptick in coffee and nicotine consumption, I did my best to wrestle that fear and anxiety to the ground till I'd squeezed the life out of it, and hopefully I'm not too much worse for the wear. Less than two months ago I was driving a truck full of materials to work everyday, wearing a toolbelt and leaching onto the neck of the taxpayer like a parasite and I fucking hated it. Yesterday I was offered a white-collar position in private industry complete with my own personal private office furnished with a couch and cable T.V, and what appears to be a free, and open and creative environment/culture; one that I'd only ever imagined existed as a possibility for me. I made that happen and I take pride in that. I'm just starting to fear what I could do with a year, and how I'll ever forgive myself if I don't make the best use of that time. It's funny; stress and anxiety and fear can be such beautiful and horrible things. I know that it's not all sunshine and butterflies. I know that this new job isn't and never will be perfect. I know that it will present all kinds of new and interesting and fear & anxiety provoking problems and challenges. I know that the struggle to be a better person never ends. I know all of these things, and I wouldn't have it any other way. For a brief moment though, today I pause to take measure of my accomplishment. I feel like I've proved to myself that I've got some kind of integrity or credibility that makes me worthy of participating in this community. I required that proof, for my own sanity. In recognition of this experience, I think I'll be rebranding myself here, if only as a gesture of symbolic value, marking what I hope to be a transformative event in my life. I intend for this to represent real and lasting change in who I am as a person. Living in the present can be such a difficult to do, but I think I've done so and it's been exhilarating and terrifying and fun and new. I couldn't be more pleased. If you've made it this far, maybe you're thinking, "All this over changing jobs?" You'd be right--- That is the outward facing change. You also couldn't be more wrong--- Changing careers was just a result of me regaining my long lost Mojo, and that was something I desperately needed. It was the result of my first real encounter with my childhood self, maybe, and he took me to the woodshed. I was not being myself, I'd become some crippled, broken, ghostly shadow of my former self. I'd lost all of my self-respect and self-worth and that was made manifest in my profession/employment (and in other ways, no doubt). A two minute interaction of happenstance lit a spark in my soul and I just fed it as much fuel and oxygen as I could manage. I'm pleased to say, I think I've regained my self-respect, and I've done it myself, which is important to me, for better or for worse. Now, I just have to worry about not flaming out, but that's for another day. I'll end with two parting thoughts. First: Never take for granted the power that an idea or a few words can have on someones life. Second: Grab life by the balls, and squeeze until it squeals.

Hey Atticas, how are you? How have things been going? I want to apologize to you for not responding to your message sooner. It's been more than a month, and I just now saw your message. I'll be starting another thread shortly, and among other things I'll be explaining why I haven't been active on the boards for several weeks. I wouldn't ignore you and I'm sorry. I really appreciate you having some regard for my thoughts, and I hope you're doing well. Daisy's post(#22), particularly the 2nd half, in my opinion, is beautiful, brilliant, and spot on. I'd give it careful consideration. My apologies again, for talking so long to reply. I sincerely hope I've encouraged at least one novel thought. Please, let me know if I've been helpful to you at all; I'd really like to be as useful to others as I possibly can.

I can't say for sure, but I would guess that it's a fine substitute. I'm kind of anal about going to primary sources, but in this case, I think you're safe. Certainly better than nothing

I have a hard time telling whether Joe is truly in disagreement or playing devil's advocate, and I think both are the case at different times. I guess it's a mark of someone who's good at playing devils advocate; which is probably easier on topics where he's changed his beliefs, but is still very familiar with the opposing arguments. He used to believe the moon landing was faked until he brought it up with Neil deGrasse Tyson. I'm sure he could still argue strongly from that side, without maintaining the belief.

I think you could get by with just the audio, but he diagrams a lot of things that might add to your understanding. I guess it depends on what works best for you. Towards the end of the playlist (last 7-8 videos) I would just listen to the video with my eyes closed and focus my attention on what he was saying. That seemed to work fine for me. The great thing is you don't have to become an expert all at once; just take in what you can, and then address any questions you might have. That's my approach anyhow. I would recommend trying to listen in rather large chunks though, as opposed to a ten minute section here, and a ten minute section there. I think it's 37 videos, roughly 10 minutes long, covering the first 3, and most important, chapters of the book. Maybe taking in a chapter at a time would be a good idea. I did the first two chapters one day, and the third chapter the next day, and that seemed to work well enough for me. I've got Kindle for PC with Accessibility Plugin. I've got NVDA-- Apologies, but this is almost a foreign language to me. Nvidia graphics driver? If so, I have no idea how that may or maynot matter. I wasn't aware you could do anything besides read books on Kindle. I managed somehow to build my own linux system, but at the same time, I'm kind of retarded when it comes to tech-knowhow.

Haha, I watched that whole series ^ I should have linked it for you, Dsayers He's kinda long winded but ultimately helpful (roughly 5-6mins/page of text) If you're more of a visual learner, he's all about the whiteboard. Before I ever posted this thread I watched all of Stefan's related videos on this and somehow I didn't get it at all. I understood the individuals parts but I didn't get any cohesive understanding of how it all fit together. He does a podcast on the analytic/synthetic dichotomy that I also checked out but didn't appreciate the importance of it, I think because Stef was pretty dismissive of it. I understand now, why that is. Watch out for Muggles.

Interesting Idea. Basically, for every ounce of gold I deposit, the percentage on the note reflects how much of that gold is guaranteed to be returned to me, right? In essence, you can limit your losses, and risk what you please. That would be my general investment advice to anybody, not that they're asking It's also simple enough for 5 year old. This illustrates the different purposes a bank may serve. If all I want you to do is keep my money safe from home invaders and fires, that would be a service for which I should pay. On the other hand, if I'm lending you the money knowing you will use it to pursue risk and reward, I've provided the service and deserve to be compensated. Simply put: Full Reserve banking, I am a customer; Fractional Reserve, I'm an investor. I often wonder which system people would prefer if they didn't have to take risk to keep up with inflation. More often than not, people today are already paying a fee for bank deposits, when you account for inflation. The status quo is so preposterous when you think about it that way. A person lends their money to risk taking institutions and are only compensated with a fixed rate of interest that doesn't even break even. What kind of investor does that? When the downsides of a Fractional Reserve bank rear their ugly heads (Bank Runs, Insolvency) the State steps in with a Bailout. "Look, it's a Full Reserve Bank; Your money's still there!" "This is why you need us!" Meanwhile the whacko with gold and cash in a safe in the basement pays for the bailout... Insanity that only free competition can correct.

Good points Mike. I thought I'd add an important element to what you're pointing out. The FDIC. Nobody cares where they deposit thier money because the government insures all deposits below $250k, and have paid out on claims above and beyond 250k. In a free society, a bank would have to prove it's safety to earn your business. As it is, they don't have to prove anything to customers. They just have to placate bureaucratic regulators. Moral Hazard comes from both bailouts and deposit insurance. To MJ: Check out Magnus' video; I was showing my nerdiness by linking something so long. His is shorter and more to the point. There are also audiobook versions on youtube if you'd prefer that.

If I could just chime in on this phenomenon-- I get this in almost every aspect of my life. The other day I was watching a eulogy delivered by Kevin Costner at Whitney Houston's funeral. He was going on about their shared experiences as children in the baptist church. He describes abuse, and everyone laughs, at the funeral of a woman who struggled with, and lost a battle against drug abuse. Does he point out that child abuse is correlated with drug abuse? Fat chance... Five years ago, this would never have occured to me. Now, I feel like I'm on the outside looking in at the insanity. It's hard for me to enjoy insanity, and it seems like the insanity is everywhere! I used to be massively into the mainstream American sports, and now I find them terribly boring and mundane. This week I was invited to a SuperBowl party, and I think to myself, "Out of everything I could be doing, do I really want to go to SuperBowl party?" Not really... Comedy I used to think was funny, now seems retarded. Fuck, Stefan, where's my blue pill? To answer your question, "Why is this happening to me?"--- My guess is that you begin to constantly frame everything in reference to your concepts of truth and virtue. Any time that your actions/beliefs conflict with what you know to be true and virtuous, you feel this anxiety or guilt. It's like your brains way of calling out to you, "Hello? We've got a contradiction here... Are you going to deal with this or not? Hello?" It's important to differentiate from catholic guilt though, in that it's not based on mysticism and threats of hell and damnation. I'm not sure what exactly you mean by bad art, but I think it's natural to adopt a new perspective for evaluating art. I'm assuming here that Stefan is your kind-of authority on truth and virtue and anarcho-capitalism. You're simply asking yourself, does this piece of work tell a story, and if so, does it reflect my values? Of course it could just be a giant painting of a grasshopper; in that case, I don't know if Stefan likes grasshoppers or not...

Hey, MJ, welcome! Before answering your questions I'll link you to the first of a four part series, "A History of Money and Banking in the United States." You may find this informative, and that it covers several of your questions in addition to many others one might have. Beware, in it's entirety, it's several hours of enjoyment http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q8e-e9xtFWA&list=PLDiz2cb2sFmTDhsKg8JPA7w_Gsk5waV7s 1) One of the causes of bank runs would be bad bank management. If the bank starts doing things it's customers disapprove of, they withdrawal their money. The Federal Reserve did not solve the problem of Bank runs: Bear Stearns, Countrywide Financial, Washington Mutual, Wachovia, and others experienced a Bank run between 2000-2010 in the US. If anything, the Federal Reserve created a breeding ground for Bank runs. 2) Yes there was. To your second question: It's open to debate. I take the position that full reserve banking is preferred. I also tend to think of fractional reserve banking as a semi-fradulent, juggling act/ponzi scheme. I will point out though, when you talk about monetary policy, you imply a central policymaker. In a free economy, banks could operate as fractional reserve or full reserve banks, and consumers would decide which they preferred. Runs on the Bank are only possible with a fractional reserve policy; If it's a full reserve bank, there will always be enough money to satisfy depositors, by definition. The worst case scenario would be that you have to wait a few days for money to be geographically moved to your bank, assuming they safeguard the majority of money elsewhere and you want cash. 3) You're not giving them enough credit. They are well aware of the inflationary effects and it doesn't hurt their agenda. By using fractional reserve banking, they can lend out 8-9 times more money than they would otherwise be able to. Who cares about a little inflation when you have the power to create money out of thin air and lend it at interest? 4) I'm assuming you're talking about our 17 trillion dollar national debt. It isn't real in the sense that it's not backed by any hard asset. The reason governments like inflation is that we can pay back 17 trillion devalued dollars. Suppose the money supply doubled; we'd still owe 17 trillion, it would just be worth half as much. Anytime you owe someone a ton of money, you should want inflation. I don't think Fiat currency should exist; it requires laws and the use of force for adoption. Anytime competition is outlawed, it's safe to assume that the reason is it wouldn't win in competition. These aren't the most thorough answers, but hopefully I've given you some good information. Was this helpful?

Here's your flagpole! All kidding aside, and I am kidding, I found this really fascinating. I had a real nice mental masturbation session on the applications of libertarian ethics for these nice young girls. That they both desire to be a mother, for instance, I found very intriguing; assuming they wouldn't adopt, I wonder how they would go about picking the father(s)/husband(s)... They practice negotiation by virtual neccessity, though there was definately an Alpha/Beta dynamic at play. How else could they be driving?! The fact that they have contrasting personalities makes perfect sense to me, but it makes me wonder what determined who was who if personality isn't innate, and they share as much common experience as any two individuals could. I find abnormal people to be so incredibly interesting, so I thought I'd share with y'all. (I say abnormal in the kindest way possible) This also brings up an old dilemma, for want of a better word. That is, how do you navigate respecting the individuals rights and desires, while recognizing how much they have to offer scientific researchers? Obviously the individual's rights prevail, but there is a long line of scientists/doctors that would love to have access to them... Another theme at play was that the community is kind and strangers are rude and inconsiderate. I was pleasantly surprised with how well treated they seemed to be in public school. Of course, that doesn't mean they aren't abused, but I didn't get the impression that they were either. Have a look-see if this seems interesting to you. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=axKkNI6Ialg

Yes, I'm working my way through it for a second time. I found it fairly dense, as a lay-philosopher. I'd be reading the same sentence three times and still not be sure what she meant I feel a bit silly that I hadn't taken the time to read much of Rand's published work, or anything Plato besides The Republic. There's been so many other people I've been reading and I never made myself aware of how much of a philosopher she really was... I already have a vastly greater appreciation for her work, and I'm sure I'm not quite fluent enough to grasp the depth of it. I get the feeling that this is one of those books I'll come back to in 5 years and find all kinds of stuff I didn't appreciate/notice before. I'm quite relieved to have found some sanity in Epistemology; I was worried all of philosophy was built on the foundation of gummy bears. For me, definately worth owning a hard copy, and I don't just stick anything on my bookshelf

Check^ I'm tremendously sorry for what you went through. Nobody should ever have to endure such a thing. It's not for me to offer you advice, but I completely share Coreforcruxes sentiments. I'm so sorry, and I'm almost sure someone here can give you what I cannot.

Overall, a pretty good show, check it out. I was a bit disappointed however with Peter's handling of the environmental questions. These were discussed at length and I don't recall him ever referencing property rights. Joe goes after Peter on fracking and the BP oil spill and argues that environmental damage is unquantifiable and should be avoided at every cost. I wish Peter had made the arguments from a property rights perspective, rather than going on about market mechanisms. Maybe this would have led down a rabbit hole of "does any have a right to own a section of the planet and do anything they want with it," or "who owns the ocean." Most, if not all, of what Peter says is true, but perhaps not most effective if you're trying to speak to the "environmentalist" crowd. Of course, maybe that wasn't his goal... I also thought he could have handled the questions about China better, but he made some pretty good points in doing so. Happy listening

I would say I know for certain that it (a particular theory/truth claim) doesn't have the right facts, or all of the facts if it doesn't have perfect predictive power at all times and in all circumstances. Lacking perfect predictive power, you'd at least have to have some theory accounting for the error, and an ability to isolate it. Otherwise, you're just "pretty close." I'll have to think about that question, I'm not sure... In answer to the question about my intent: yes and no, maybe. How do you like that for an answer haha? I haven't made this clear, and I might begin to condradict some of my previous posts but my position is kind of malleable, in the sense that I'm discovering things as I discuss and research ideas. Sorry for any confusion I may have caused or may cause in the future. Below I'm going to detail a kind of framework I'm working with, and then go through and address your post more directly. If you'd prefer, feel free to skip ahead and come back to this. The distinction I'm trying to draw is between conceptual, abstract, a priori, axiomatic, logical deductive knowledge; and scientific empirical knowledge. Furthermore, within the realm of scientific knowledge, I think a further distinction may be made between a present time "in the moment" perceptual knowledge (an interplay of perception and concepts) and a more fundemental framework of objective theoretical knowledge. In the apriori, axiomatic realm, we have self evident claims like "2+2=4," and "Man acts purposefully," and, "I own myself," and, "This is an apple."(I'm holding an apple) These claims can be said to be certainly true. In the category of perceptual knowledge you have claims like, "My shoes are brown," or "The pencil bends when partially submerged in water, and viewed from the proper position," or "The sun rises every morning in the East." Perception without concepts or language does not produce useful knowledge, but rather an experience. Sensory perception is constant input, which is constantly tested against held conceptual or theoretical knowledge. Claims of this sort are subjective and not necessarily true, because they lie fundementally on fallible cognitive inference and the validity of prior knowledge conceptual understanding. Because sensory perception is fundementally empirical, these claims must be compatible with theoretical or conceptual knowledge to make a valid truth claim. Incompatibility presents a problem requiring integration with accepted truths or "discoverable" truths, and is the precurser to rejection and the aquisition of new knowledge via an inquisitive mind. In the latter category you have claims like, "The color brown is a perceptual illusion produced when the human brain processes particular wavelengths of light," or "light is refracted when passing though water in such and such a way," or "The Earth rotates around the sun in such and such a way." These claims must be falsifiable, and the more falsifiable, the better. The truth value of these claims are proportional to the precision of hypothesized predictions reflecting empirical evidence and the consistency with which it can be replicated. The "truest" claim is most falsifiable (most precise), never falsified, and perfectly and precisely predicts future behavior with the unwavering consistency. I'm cool with this so far, with one minor exception. I wonder about the term "programs." To me, that implies a programmer. I think it would be more accurate to describe it as emergent phenomenon of mutation, or randomness, or something less directed, for want of a better word. But I'm with you. This seems perfectly fine and likely to me, and I quite agree with that last distinction if I understand you correctly. I don't want you to think you haven't added anything new, because you have, but I still find myself in agreement. The fact that there is much error as a result of the emergence of perception fits my way of thinking (not that that makes it true). More error=more problems=more opportunity for differentiation=more random beneficial mutation. You're making too much sense to me. Dammit, dinosaurs can do math too? I'm kidding. I'd never really thought of this but, having never observed a dinosaur, I still think it's unlikely a TRex would try to fight off 20 raptors. Who knows though; I've seen a Pit Bull try to fight off an overwhelming number of "attackers", rather than flee. Is it safe to assume you're pretty much describing a fight or flight mechanism governed by the Dino's perception of quantity or threat level and "Those dino's aren't me?" That wouldn't seem unreasonable to me. Yes, this is what I haven't articulated, but have been trying to get at. Not only are our sensations, percept, and concepts valid or invalid, but so is our reasoning, I would add. The "rules" of reason are objective, but our application/acceptance is not-- I hope that's clear. To bring these things into unison is to pursue truth, I believe. I was with you until your last paragraph, and I started getting wobbly knees. Let me re-hash to make sure I understand, and that we're in agreement. -Reality is objective and governed by universal laws-- Agreed. -Humans gain knowledge of reality through the senses-- Agreed, I think. I'm kind of wishy washy here, but I think it's just definitions. It seems more accurate to me to say Humans gain information about reality through the senses. If knowledge=Information, then that seems fine. Knowledge seems to imply truth value, and sense data needn't necessarily correspond with truth. Right, like pencils don't bend when you stick them in a cup of water. This appears as a phenomenon to us, and begs for interrogation. -Conceptualization allows for objectivity to be a thing in itself-- I had to read that about 3 times so bear with me. Objectivity requires reasoning, and reasoning requires concepts? Is that right? Clearly objectivity isn't a tangible thing... -Mathematics is concept that is based on the concept of objectivity-- Agreed. Fortunately, or unfortunately I don't have much to disagree with you about. Great article, by the way, if that's it in it's entirety. I think the issue I've been having is that in my understanding of the history of philosophy/epistemology, there seems to be this titanic battle over what knowledge and truth are: a priori, logic, deductive vs. a posteriori, empirical, inductive. I'm inclined to say they reinforce each other, but I get the impression that it would be some sort of philosophical heresy. I am sure that reality is objective. I am sure that perception is information. I am sure that we can use that information to discover things that are true about reality. I'm also sure that 2+2=4 and that I own my body. Why is this so incompatible for philosophers? {edit} I think I may be showing my ignorance of objectivist epistemology here. Excuse me while I sink into the background and correct this.

I don't know what you mean when you say "less true." My only point is that you can't be certain. I'm thinking of science as this methodology by which our understanding is this slow process of convergence to the truth that comes about by finding errors in our theories. It seems axiomatic to me that a falsifiable theory cannot be certainly true. You'd have to exhaust the infinite number of ways the theory could be proved false, or if you prefer, imperfect or imprecise. Special relativity was a refinement; in other words, classical mechanics was proved false under certain conditions, and special relativity attempted to fill the void. If truth is correspondence with the facts, derived from sense perceptions, it begs the question. Which facts? How do we know that the theory corresponds with the rights facts, or all of the facts? {edit} I wanted to add something that I overlooked on my first reading; the idea of setting limitations, and being forthright about model error. This is proper science, in my opinion. I think what Einstein did was not prove special relativity, but rather proved classical mechanics as incomplete/false. In the area's that classical mechanics were(in hindsight) clearly false, special relativity was proposed as an explanation, and has held up as far as we can tell. In a 100,000 years will we have a better understanding that corrects errors in Einstein's work, or builds upon it to explain some unforeseeable circumstance or phenomenon? If that is possible, I don't see how it can be said that the claims are absolutely and certainly true. They're just true, near as we can tell. I've read you next post and enjoyed it, as well as considered some other material. I think I may need a few hours to marinate and maybe delineate my arguments/thoughts a bit.

What is CO? I had no idea what you were talking about. I should have asked. Apologies {edit} Nevermind, Carbon Monoxide, I gotcha. I'm not saying that Carbon Monoxide doesn't exist because we don't percieve it. We certainly percieve it's effects, like lightheadedness or whatever. I'm not suggesting sense perception is invalid, or that we can't use technology to make better use of sense perception. What I'm suggesting is that scientific truth claims are always open to falsification and therefore never certainly true. Scientific truth claims are still objective. We could still say with 99.999% certainty that nothing can travel faster than the speed of light. That could still be proved false, could it not?

Yes they'd be brown, until I pushed you into a tub of wine. Actually I wouldn't do that, but if I did.... It's also not true that color is objective. Color is an illusion developed by our brain. If they appear some color other than brown to a colorblind person, is he wrong? The perception of color is subjective. You could say your shoes reflect these wavelengths I suppose, but that doesn't mean they always will. Pi is an irrational transendetal number. i is an imaginary complex number. You can read about the properties of these things if you'd like. 22/7 is not pi, I don't know why we're talking about it. 22/7 is an approximation.

I didn't say it was certainly true that... I said it cannot be claimed certainly true, if it can be falsified. Subtle difference. If it could be potentially falsified, how could it possibly be certainly true? Changing the base does not make Pi any less of an irrational number. I agree that we use our senses to interpret reality, and detect things like carbon monoxide. I'm not suggesting sense perception is invalid, useless, or anything like that. Side note, did you ever see the savant on Letterman recite pi to a bazillion decimal places? Fascinating...

I think this makes perfect sense. Like if I'm born in complete sensory deprivation, I don't think I would in 100 years I would have developed any mathematical arguments or proofs. It's not directly related, but there's the popular pysche case of this girl Genie. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genie_%28feral_child%29#Characteristics_and_personality. I don't expect much knowledge to come from such a person. It seems clear to me that sense perception is necessary, but perhaps not sufficent. My personal inclination about the aquisition of knowledge is that it comes from errors in logic, and is validated empirically. The laws of nature must be static; else they wouldn't be laws. Our understanding of nature is evolving. Only when the theory precisely describes the empirical, is there knowledge, but not certain knowledge. .The world is round-- preposterous. Objects with mass bend light-- preposterous. People can communicate instantaneously on opposite sides of the planet-- preposterous. Stupid theory->testing->didn't work->Stupid theory #2->Oh shit, that's close->Refine theory->retest->empirical validation eureka->theory tenetively "proved". It must be logical to be true. Empirical evidence shows us that there are errors in accepted logic when we propose irrational theories and stumble closer to the truth. In short, I think the problem of induction is not to be overlooked. I accept the products of the scientific method in my everyday life, but I also accept that much of what I know, may in fact be false, or at least that it can't be proved with certainty. Will the sun "rise" tomorrow? I have no reason to believe it won't, but I also cannot prove it will. It seems to me that a priori/axiomatic truths are required to salvage ethics (doesn't UPB rest on them?). They're certainly required to salvage Austrian Economics, of which I'm a proponent. As I understand it, empirical epistemology rejects them, while I accept them as true by definition. It was always true that nature behaved in a certain way, I think knowledge is a rational proof describing it precisely. Was the "stupid theory" derived from sense perception? I'm certain we need sense perception to even think about these things, but it's not clear to me that it's sufficient. I may be 99% sure that objects with mass don't bend light, because it never has. Then Eistein comes up with a stupid theory that turned science on it's head. It seems to me that the only Truth is axiomatic, or true by definition or extended deduction. Truths about nature are always falsifiable, otherwise, it wouldn't be science. What is missed is that they just haven't been falsified yet, if ever, but it must be possible and they cannot therefore be claimed as certainly true. Sorry if I got away from the math too much, and wasn't responding directly to you all the way through. I was hoping to drag the discussion back a bit more on topic. I think I'm pretty much in agreement with you though Chris. For you Dsayers: http://www.proofwiki.org/wiki/Definition:Complex_Number http://www.math.toronto.edu/mathnet/answers/imagexist.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euler%27s_formula#Applications_in_complex_number_theory The last one is supplemental/related

Yeah I noticed the Numberphile guy tackled Pi, but not i. Pi is much easier to deal with, I wish he would have tackled i. The problem with proving Pi is it has to terminate to be a thing. No matter how close your approximation, your are talking about your approximation, not pi. Because Pi doesn't terminate you can't really call it a number. I'm probably not doing this justice... I've studied a decent amount of math, but it's a bit rusty. I'm not certain of the proof myself, I want to say it has something to do with Euler's Formula or the Quadratic equation, but that could be totally wrong. At any rate, it's used in many area's of calculus, and with many practical applications, and held up. Let me check the interwebs and see what I can come up with.

Lysander Spooner speaks to this issue in No Treason. The State has the right to initiate the use of force. It is not emergent, but rather derived from the consent of the governed. The act of voting is the only way to legitimize an implicit social contract signed by nobody. In so doing, you surrender your right to not be aggressed against by the State. The State has every right to aggress against it's voter's, for they have surrendered rights and responsibilities by agreeing to the implicit social contract via the act of voting. The State does not however have the right to aggress against a non-voter, or "soveriegn man," as they might identify themselves. Of course, as a practical matter, don't expect the State (or slaveowner) to recognize the distinction lol, they'll trample you just the same. Technically speaking, I think voting may be the initiation of the use of force against yourself. Maybe not the initiation, but certainly permission. Faced with a coerced decision you can either be pragmatic or protest the coercion. I suppose the challenge lies in finding an effective means of protest.

Perhaps this will be helpful in demonstrating competing thoughts. I'm afraid I'd be thought of as a looney, but I'd like to hear more about fictionalism. Each of the 3 schools of thought, so to speak, seems to have problems, and I can't say that any of them present a closed case argument. If you're too lazy to watch all ten minutes, the imaginary number talk is around the 4:20 mark. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EGDCh75SpQ

Yeah puzzles are fun too. I'm gonna nerd out here but they definately help develop an eye for dynamic play, if you know what I mean. A difficult puzzle will stick in my mind like a splinter for days until I solve it. I find any kind of math or logic puzzle irresistably addicting. It needs to be solved!!! I can't just let them be.