Counterglow is getting spammed -- check it out!

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by Agathon


It depends on what role you assign to conceptual innovation in science. The arguments are far different, but the basic idea belongs to the atomists. I assign a high role to conceptual innovation because I am not a classical realist about science.

Minus all the lingo, what you're trying to say is that it was very important simply to have said that things have a smallest part, despite the fact that you had no way of determining at the time whether or not it was true?

Bull. Anybody can sit around and make **** up. If you say enough stuff some of it will probably end up being true too. There's no way of separating the garbage from the accidental truth. If anything it sidetracks scientific debate into avenues which are dead-ends until you get much, much more knowledge.

Stick to what you know, or what you might be able to figure out. Wild-eyed speculation doesn't do anybody any good.

[Agathon]

Stick to what you know, or what you might be able to figure out. Wild-eyed speculation doesn't do anybody any good.

OK - what if the only means you have available is reason and your regular perceptual contact with the world. You can't really conduct experiments, because you don't have the means, so you tend to the abstract. But of course you don't think of it as the abstract, because you don't know what that means either - because no-one has ever tried to say this sort of stuff before.

Bull. Anybody can sit around and make **** up. If you say enough stuff some of it will probably end up being true too. There's no way of separating the garbage from the accidental truth

Yes there is. Logical consistency. You can know that something is wrong if it turns out to be incoherent. Refining this capacity is essential for science to even get off the ground, yet it has nothing to do with experiments.

[Agathon]

You are beating these people with modern sticks, KH. That's silly. If we want to know how we got where we are now, it all ends back up with these guys, no matter how wrong they were.

Hell, we are probably quite wrong, perhaps even in our basic methodology. Yet future persons will want to see what we thought and how they got to where they did from where we were. That's history.

[KrazyHorse]

No I'm not, dude. There are certain questions I know I can't answer without much more knowledge. I should be berated for speculating on them if I were to do so. Just like people who engaged in baseless speculation back then should be. Otherwise people don't learn the lesson and we end up with string theorists.

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by Agathon
Yes there is. Logical consistency. You can know that something is wrong if it turns out to be incoherent. Refining this capacity is essential for science to even get off the ground, yet it has nothing to do with experiments.

And the point is that with the level of knowledge they had there were entirely consistent viewpoints to be had on both sides of the issue.

[Agathon]

No I'm not, dude. There are certain questions I know I can't answer without much more knowledge. I should be berated for speculating on them if I were to do so. Just like people who engaged in baseless speculation back then should be. Otherwise people don't learn the lesson and we end up with string theorists.

If everyone thought that way, nothing would ever get done. More to the point, if they hadn't started thinking this way, despite their problems, we wouldn't be where we are.

And the point is that with the level of knowledge they had there were entirely consistent viewpoints to be had on both sides of the issue.

That is true, but it does not mean that every theory proposed is consistent - that's why they argued with each other and certain ideas got dumped.

But what's funny is that you are attributing to them a knowledge of logic that they just didn't have. Oddly enough because formal logic didn't exist and they didn't understand it. You had an education which taught you things you take for granted because they have become part of the cultural commons. But Zeno and company had to work it out for themselves - that's a lot harder than it looks because they are groping in the dark. You can't assume that they were just ignoring your methodology of investigation, since they were trying to formulate just such a methodology from very sparse materials.

Parmenides is the first person to offer a logical proof, yet even he really didn't understand the implications of what he was doing. Our modern notion of logical consistency is an artifact that is historically related to the work of the early philosophers. They had to think this stuff out and then systematize it - not an easy task. It looks easy to us because we are looking at it with modern eyes.

That is your problem. You want to look back at these people as if everything that seems obvious to you, should have seemed obvious to them, or that your methodology of investigating the world should have seemed obvious to them.

Well the news is that it didn't, and for good reason - our view of logic (what it is and what it does) developed piecemeal over the centuries - it is not a given.

It's like someone going back to the Middle Ages and trying to explain to them our values of personal liberty - they are going to think you are nuts, because they just don't do morality that way.

[The Mad Monk]

Originally posted by KrazyHorse
No I'm not, dude. There are certain questions I know I can't answer without much more knowledge. I should be berated for speculating on them if I were to do so.

KH, are you a fan of Arthur Conan Doyle, by any chance? He had Sherlock Holmes say much the same thing.

[KrazyHorse]

No, actually, I'm not.

[KrazyHorse]

Did Sherlock throw a passing gibe at string theorists by any chance?

[The Mad Monk]

No, just at stupid policemen jumping to conclusions.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

Kids- this thread is what happens when the promising topic of goat fellation gets into the hands of the dull. Be warned.

[Dinner]

I really think the goat ****ers were more interesting then this thread.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Lazarus and the Gimp
Kids- this thread is what happens when the promising topic of goat fellation gets into the hands of the dull. Be warned.

That's because I throttled the goat after establishing a thriving fair trade pashmina business, whipped up a very taste curry goat with dirty rice and callaloo soup and with the goat's head held a ritual black mass invoking the shade of the Mendes Goat .


These things just happen in the gaps, Laz. , and time can't always be spared to inform you to stop grouting the walls of the bathroom and pop over to Bolventor for a sabbat.


Next time, though.

[Jon Miller]

Originally posted by KrazyHorse
The most disturbing thing I saw all night was Protein's optical illusion picture.



They did put a lot of effort into it though. A few more years and they might manage to get a reaction...

it waves...

Jon Miller

[Stefu]

Originally posted by Lazarus and the Gimp
Kids- this thread is what happens when the promising topic of goat fellation gets into the hands of the dull. Be warned.

Now isn't that the truth.

Let's get back to the topic of CG getting spammed, as that is vastly more interesting than... than... whatever I just skimmed over. Can someone link to a few CG threads (and possibly to something from the other forum, as well) that summarize the whole deal? Possibly with pictures included.

Also, why do I have the feeling that many of the folks who invaded CG do, in fact, listen to a lot of Insane Clown Posse?