Text 41026, 89 rader
Skriven 2006-10-09 20:53:44 av mark lewis (1:3634/12.0)
  Kommentar till text 40902 av Michiel van der Vlist (2:280/5555)
Ärende: pi
==========
 MvdV> Had I written it in Dutch, most Dutch speakers would have read it
 MvdV> the same way I think. Most people - no matter what their native
 MvdV> language - are poor on formal logic and have trouble properly
 MvdV> interpreting sentences containing an "if". 

 MvdV> How about this one:

 MvdV> "If two plus two equals five then the moon is made of green
 MvdV> cheese". 

 MvdV> Would you say that this is a true statement? 

yes, absolutely... because both are false... 2 + 2 cannot equal 5 and the moon
is not made of green cheese... crusty yellow cheese, maybe... but not green O:)

 MvdV> Maybe you would, but most people would say it is not. Everyone 
 MvdV> knows the moon is not made of green cheese don't they? Formal 
 MvdV> logic however says that when the "if" is not satisfied, you can 
 MvdV> put anything after the "then" - true or false - and the 
 MvdV> statement as a whole will always be true.

i'm really glad that i haven't (yet) been contaminated by "higher education",
hahaha... that's kinda like some of my old friends having taken psychology
courses and completely loosing their minds due to analyzing everyone's actions
when before they were just having as much fun as everyone else... in other
words, they changed and basically just didn't "get" the fun things any more...

 ml>  to take it the other way as you are saying above, is to really
 ml> be playing with the words and in effect "setting a trap"...

 MvdV> Only someone out to "get me" would make an issue out of a simple
 MvdV> typo. It could have been construed as a trap had the typo been
 MvdV> intentional. It was not, so whoever was trapped got trapped by
 MvdV> his own doing.

agreed... the reason why i even got involved was because it was a typo but you
were saying that you didn't write it... remember, we're talking about plain,
right in front of your eyes, english... think simply, not convoluted, ok? ;)

 MvdV>> Just as in the first variant I would merely have claimed
 MvdV>> that my agreement did not matter any more than my agreement to
 MvdV>> a preferred value of pi of 3.0. The value of pi isn't subject
 MvdV>> my preference.

 ml> then why didn't you just state that as plainly as you did just now?

 MvdV> Because at the time it seemed like a good idea to state it the
 MvdV> way I did. I did not account for making a typo. In hindsight the
 MvdV> latter way would indeed have been more clear. Well hindsight is
 MvdV> always 20/20 and this is a hobby. When I have to weigh every word
 MvdV> on a gold scale as if if were a legal document the fun will
 MvdV> quickly wear of.

yep... and for many, this is also why there's so many arguments and that's not
any fun, either... i've backed way off many times over the last years because i
was tired of all the arguing going on all the time... at work, home, hobby,
play... yuck!

 ml> it would have been a whole lot simpler and we'd not have had all the
 ml> arguments going back and forth as they have been... is it just a
 ml> method of generating traffic so that the echo looks "alive"?? LOL!

 MvdV> Even better would have been to simply stop writing all together
 MvdV> and just disconnect this echo.

no, i can't say that... however, the saying "choose your battles" comes to
mind... myself? i've been doing pretty good at not getting into any battles and
my attitude is much better for that O:)

 ml>> another and refuses to admit that truth... michiel, just admit
 ml>> the truth...

 MvdV>> What truth? That I made a typo? Of course I made a typo. Anyone
 MvdV>> could see that. Including the one who twisted my statement into
 MvdV>> me claiming pi equals 3.12145.

 ml> "the one who"... hunh? it wasn't just one... there are quite a few
 ml> native english speakers who read it that way...

 MvdV> Well, they were wrong but it would have been no issue if those
 MvdV> focussed on finding me at fault would not have made an issue out
 MvdV> of it. And that includes you sir.

sorry... however, i wasn't focussed on finding you at fault... remember, i
don't fight any more if it can be helped... and it can be O:)

)\/(ark

 * Origin:  (1:3634/12)