Paradox Answers

[The Mad Monk]

Yes, you would never be born in the future, but that future exists as a universe "spun off" from your own in the instant you made the killing shot; that said, you can never really go home again, because the number of "spun off" universes are literally infinite, and you would never find your own to return to.

[loinburger]

A prisoner is told that he is to be executed on the following week at noon, but he will not know in advance the day on which he is to be executed. The prisoner reasons that he can't be executed on Saturday, because after noon on Friday he'll know that he's going to be executed on Saturday. By the same reasoning he can't be executed on Friday, because after noon on Thursday he'll know that he is going to be executed on Friday (because he can't be executed on Saturday). Applying this reasoning to every other day leads the prisoner to the conclusion that he can't be executed on the following week.

On the following week he was executed on Wednesday. Did the warden lie to the prisoner, or was the prisoner's reasoning fallacious?

(A less grim version of this paradox exists in which a teacher says that she will give a pop quiz next week and the students won't know on which day they'll have the quiz)

[loinburger]

Achilles is in a race with a tortoise - he runs ten times faster than the tortoise but the tortoise has a 10 meter head start. After Achilles runs ten meters the tortoise will have run one meter; after Achilles runs one meter the tortoise will have run one tenth of a meter; after Achilles runs one tenth of a meter the tortoise will have run one hundredth of a meter. Achilles realizes that he can never catch the tortoise, because whenever he attempts to close the distance the tortoise will have extended the distance.

[loinburger]

Hearts of Iron IV was released on the 72nd anniversary of the Normandy landings

[Aeson]

Pinochio: My nose will grow now!

[Kidlicious]

Pinochio: My nose will grow now!

This thread sucked until you posted this.

[Kidlicious]

elok: No one can have the mind of God.
kidicious: How is it possible to know that?
elok: You are literally insane.

[Elok]

[Kidlicious]

[Elok]

Am unsure whether you did a Google search for "kitty with exposed anus and genitals" or just pulled it from your big stash of KWEAAG pics. Or which of the two possibilities would be worse. In either case, I bet that cat pees sitting down, and is therefore not on your side.

[The Mad Monk]

Kid should be banned for posting bestiality porn.

[kentonio]

that said, you can never really go home again, because the number of "spun off" universes are literally infinite, and you would never find your own to return to.

How could you ever know it was your own anyway, given that according to that theory even the most minute difference (a grain of sand moving in one direction rather than another for instance) would spawn a new universe.

I suspect the whole thing is bollocks to be honest.

[kentonio]

A prisoner is told that he is to be executed on the following week at noon, but he will not know in advance the day on which he is to be executed. The prisoner reasons that he can't be executed on Saturday, because after noon on Friday he'll know that he's going to be executed on Saturday. By the same reasoning he can't be executed on Friday, because after noon on Thursday he'll know that he is going to be executed on Friday (because he can't be executed on Saturday). Applying this reasoning to every other day leads the prisoner to the conclusion that he can't be executed on the following week.

On the following week he was executed on Wednesday. Did the warden lie to the prisoner, or was the prisoner's reasoning fallacious?

The prisoners reasoning is sound for the Saturday (assuming a Sunday to Saturday week) but complete nonsense for all the others.

[loinburger]

The answer I prefer is that the hangman or electrocutioner or whatever flips a coin each day - heads the prisoner dies, tails his execution is deferred. The executioner doesn't know on which day the prisoner will be executed so neither can the prisoner know, and there is only a very minute chance that the hangman will need to lie (either by deferring the execution til the following week or else by automatically doing the execution on Saturday without the coin flip), and this chance can be further reduced by flipping multiple coins (if either coin comes up heads then the prisoner is executed)

[Dry]

or flip one coin the first day, two the second,...