Time loops were predicted by mathematician and close friend of Einstein Kurt Gödel. The past and future loop in to one. A former radical turned police detective discovers that the road to solving a murder may be found in a Gödel loop that leads him to the past, future, and to the very edge of what is possible.Check out a free preview here.
Saturday, July 26, 2014
Gödel Loop: A New short story by Nathaniel Bates
Nathaniel Bates has a new short science fiction story up for purchase at Scholardarity, called Gödel Loop:
Saturday, June 07, 2014
An Ode to Hume's Skepticism
An Ode to Hume's Skepticism
By
Jason Zarri
The legacy of David Hume, like the appearance of the Moon,
is sometimes waxing, sometimes waning,
but hopefully never, forever fading.
The Treatise fell dead-born from the press,
The Enquiries had more success,
and the Dialogues should still impress
all those who in clerical garb do dress.
But be you "friend" or be you "foe";
please, do not betide him woe.
For concerning all subjects whatsoever,
he strove to be skeptical in equal measure.
Skepticism, being no exception,
itself came under his inspection.
At Pyrrho's doctrine he looked askance,
but in the Academy's he saw a chance
to get vain reason to abdicate its pride,
letting humble experience show forth its light far and wide.
And Hume himself, though he could have been humbler,
helped to wake Kant from his dogmatic slumber.
So everyone, pray, of every school,
consider Hume may be errant, but surely no fool.
Would it not do us much good to admit,
'tis the height of folly to seek more knowledge than our nature will permit?
Finally, to any philosophers who meet this maxim with dread,
I say: Beware of rushing in where fools would fear to tread!
Wednesday, June 04, 2014
God - Voltaire's Philosophical Dictionary
" I am not an idolator," answered Dondindac.
" You must be an idolator," said Logomacos, " seeing that you are not Greek. Tell me, what was that you were singing in your barbarous Scythian jargon? "
" All tongues are equal in the ears of God," answered the Scythian. " We were singing His praises."
" That's very extraordinary," returned the theologian. " A Scythian family who pray God without having been taught by us! " He soon engaged Dondindac the Scythian in conversation, for he knew a little Scythian, and the other a little Greek. The following conversation was found in a manuscript preserved in the library of Constantinople." [...]
-- http://history.hanover.edu/texts/voltaire/volgod.html
Sunday, May 25, 2014
Saturday, May 24, 2014
Friday, May 16, 2014
The Phantom of the Qualia
The Phantom of the Qualia
Lyrics for a Musical Philosophical Parody
By
Jason Zarri
(The following is "mashup" parody of [and tribute to!] "The Phantom of the Opera" and "Music of the Night" from Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical The Phantom of the Opera and the debate over the ontological status of qualia in the philosophy of mind. Thanks also to Peter Hollens and his wife Evynne Hollens for their Phantom of the Opera Medley on YouTube, which is what inspired this post.)
:-)
In sleep she sang to me, in dreams she came.
Her voice; it calls to me, and speaks my name;
and in this labyrinth, where brains are blind,
The Phantom of the Qualia is here, and soothes my mind.
Qualia, qualia, defy some's comprehension,
but qualia, qualia are the stuff of intellection!
Quite magically the senses, they break the mind's defenses,
enthralling us in taste and sound and sight,
the power of this "phantom of the night"!
Let this Phantom lead your journey to a strange possible world
Leave all thoughts of the one you think is real!
Let her song guide you where you wish to be...
Only then will you belong to she!
She has called you,
to the seat of sweet qualia's throne,
to this kingdom where all must pay homage to qualia, qualia;
you have come here, with one purpose and one alone
Since the moment you first heard her sing,
you have needed her with you to serve you, to sing;
about qualia, qualia!
Monday, May 12, 2014
A Fuzzy Argument for Crisp Negation? (Maybe.)
Here's an argument that might be taken to show that 'not,' in English, does not express a fuzzy negation function; otherwise we have a paradox. (I'll assume throughout that talk of "degrees of truth" still makes sense for other, especially formal, languages or metalanguages.) Consider sentence S1:
S1: This sentence is half true.
S1 is true, i.e. has the value 1, if and only if it is half true, i.e. has the value 1/2. Grant for the sake of argument that we'll set aside "fuzzy dialetheism", that a statement could have multiple degrees of truth. It follows that S1 is neither true nor half true. The only value that it seems to make sense to assign to it is 0.
Now consider S2:
S2: This sentence is not half true.
S2 would seem to be true, i.e. have the value 1, if and only if it is not half true, i.e. iff it does not have the value 1/2. (If S2 did have the value 1/2, it would seem to be false, and hence also have the value 0; and we have ruled out it's having two different truth degrees.) Since it can't both have the value 1 and some value other than 1, it would seem that the only value that it makes sense to assign to it is 1.
But here's the catch: In standard fuzzy logic, p and ~p are equivalent when they both take the value 1/2. So if I were to say of some statement p that it is half true, that would, assuming that 'not' is fuzzy, be in some sense equivalent to saying that it is also half false. But S2 (so the argument goes) is equivalent to the negation of S1. It does make sense then that they have opposite truth values, given the definition of negation in fuzzy logic; yet given what I've said about the equivalence of half-truth and half-falsity their content would appear to be the same, and thus that they should accordingly have the same truth value! Strange; nay, even paradoxical, no?
Well, honestly, I'm not sure. What do you think?
S1: This sentence is half true.
S1 is true, i.e. has the value 1, if and only if it is half true, i.e. has the value 1/2. Grant for the sake of argument that we'll set aside "fuzzy dialetheism", that a statement could have multiple degrees of truth. It follows that S1 is neither true nor half true. The only value that it seems to make sense to assign to it is 0.
Now consider S2:
S2: This sentence is not half true.
S2 would seem to be true, i.e. have the value 1, if and only if it is not half true, i.e. iff it does not have the value 1/2. (If S2 did have the value 1/2, it would seem to be false, and hence also have the value 0; and we have ruled out it's having two different truth degrees.) Since it can't both have the value 1 and some value other than 1, it would seem that the only value that it makes sense to assign to it is 1.
But here's the catch: In standard fuzzy logic, p and ~p are equivalent when they both take the value 1/2. So if I were to say of some statement p that it is half true, that would, assuming that 'not' is fuzzy, be in some sense equivalent to saying that it is also half false. But S2 (so the argument goes) is equivalent to the negation of S1. It does make sense then that they have opposite truth values, given the definition of negation in fuzzy logic; yet given what I've said about the equivalence of half-truth and half-falsity their content would appear to be the same, and thus that they should accordingly have the same truth value! Strange; nay, even paradoxical, no?
Well, honestly, I'm not sure. What do you think?
Sunday, May 11, 2014
Luther's In Depth Theology for Theological Therapy: the Coram Relations
The coram-relations are analogous with the intra-psychic ego states: the superego, ego, and id and represent the relational ones for our deep selves and extended, social selves for theological therapy.
Saturday, May 10, 2014
Singer's "Famine, Affluence and Morality": Exposition and Appraisal
In his article "Famine, Affluence and Morality" Peter Singer gives a seemingly devastating critique of our ordinary ways of thinking about famine relief, charity, and morality in general. In spite of that very few people have accepted, or at any rate acted on, the conclusions he reaches. In light of these facts one might say of Singer's arguments, as Hume said of Berkeley's arguments for immaterialism, that "... they admit of no answer and produce no conviction."[1] While I do think that Singer's considerations show that people should do considerably more than most people actually do, they do not establish his conclusions in their full strength or generality. So his arguments admit of a partial answer, and once properly qualified may produce some conviction.
Friday, May 09, 2014
What is Nothing? (original)
This is your mind on Frege and Russell and Rorty and Postmodernism and Lawrence Krauss (or something). ;-)
Thursday, May 08, 2014
Link: Owl City Fireflies Parody - Celebrity
I don't mean to offend any celebrities of good will by linking to this--only those who are just "famous for being famous", as the saying goes.
;-)
Everyone screws up; however (and sorry Quine, but I think this is Analytic) no one should screw up on purpose just to get attention (even though, of course, a lot of people do like attention; though most that do just want to be loved).
Wednesday, May 07, 2014
Link: Fitness video by Lisa Tanker
I'm a guy, but I do try to be fit; so thanks to Lisa for posting!
Sunday, May 04, 2014
"This Is A Video EVERYONE Needs To See."
Ok, but things are more multifaceted than that; I think. Another name for this might be: The "Excessive Moderation Paradox Video". Different people engage with the world differently! Still, Spread the Love !!!
Cash Holes: A Quantum-Cosmological Metaphor for Misers
First, everyone should check out this article on Hawking Radiation,
and then look at this drawing of a miser ("Smaug the Stupendous"; from deviantART.com).
Get what I mean? There's a huge, Dragon-sized difference between liking money and being a miser (a cash-hole) like Smaug. A miser (or 'cash hole', in the rest of this post) is someone whose love, in the sense of charity, has collapsed into a singularity of egoistic self-centered-ness, whey money only leeches out accidentally through the outflux of "virtual cash pairs": both of which have become "real"; one of which has gotten trapped by the monetational force of the cash hole, and the other of which has escaped gone out into the universe as a "free" particle and which has a direction; but is not really "aimed" at any particular person, persons, or cause. But, of course, small enough cash holes may eventually evaporate in a frenzy monetary activity! So please, everyone, be charitable and share your love through your wealth! Don't become a cash hole!! If you do, you might end up alone, like a rock or an island!
Saturday, May 03, 2014
Castlevania The Concert: Wood Carving Partita (Performed by Michiru Yama...
I've Imagined for a while that Lisa and Dracula met at a ball where this was being played (maybe by skeletons in fancy dresses and tuxes)?
Friday, May 02, 2014
Castlevania Lords of Shadow Final Boss Cut-scenes and Ending
Gabriel Belmont: Every man has the power to repent! I have FAITH in THAT!!!
Thursday, May 01, 2014
For the [sake] of dispelling myths that vegans are weak, have a look at this..: Marzia Prince, vegan fitness model!
https://twitter.com/search?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.marziaprince.com%2F
Not vegan anymore, but when I'm doing better, maybe I can become vegan or at least vegetarian again.
A Geeky Idea for A "Pluralistic Realism" Essay Contest: Zen-ish Reasons to be A Lot Nicer to Each Other
By
Jasonus Zarrinus
A Geeky Latin-ate Comededic Philosophy / Paradox Student and Philosopher Dude
(or, in your essay, "By [insert your own name-ish thing and sub title]")
Ok, have I gotten your attention? The idea here is simple but also complex: Write your own essay inspired by this very post, submit to to jlzarri@scholardarity.com, and the most well-argued and complex yet concise ones will be posted for free on Scholardarity.com (Scholardarity.org).
Thanks, and Best Wishes!!
Wednesday, April 30, 2014
Tuesday, April 29, 2014
Hey Intellectuals! Guys and Gals!! We're all really big geeks, right?!
I feel right now like I'm Curly from the Three Stooges, and that Moe and Larry just smacked a brilliant banana-cream-pie-like idea into my kinda-sorta-dim-at-times face! Why not be more silly and funny and poke-fun-ish in our journals and articles?! But enough talk (throws sorbet glass [not really!]); please, discuss this! (Twilight-ish, glittery, CV-SotN Drac winky face! : ^ v--v ^)
Spread the Love ^ the Fun!
Castlevania Homage:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXfbNu6Typc
Ed Sheeran - I See Fire - The Hobbit - Peter Hollens
One of my favorite songs..but I think things will turn out perfectly for all good people!!!
Monday, April 28, 2014
My "translation" (there's different ones) of the 'Our Father':
My "translation" (there's different ones) of the 'Our Father':
"Our Father, who art in Heaven,
Hallowed be Thy Name.
Thy Kingdom Come,
Thy Will be done,
on Earth as it is in Heaven.
Give us this Day, our Daily Bread, and
deliver us from the time(s) of trial, as we forgive those who trespass against us.
Hallowed be Thy Name.
Thy Kingdom Come,
Thy Will be done,
on Earth as it is in Heaven.
Give us this Day, our Daily Bread, and
deliver us from the time(s) of trial, as we forgive those who trespass against us.
(For Thine is the Kingdom, and the Power, and the Glory, For Ever, and Ever and Ever.) Amen."
Sunday, April 27, 2014
Perform This Way (Parody of "Born This Way" by Lady Gaga)
Sorry Dudes, BUT I'M HIS BIGGEST FAN!! I'M SERIOUS ABOUT HEALING AND FORGIVENESS, BUT CAN'T THE WORLD BE A LITTLE WEIRD-AL-ISH!! (YA KNOW, TO CHANGE!!)
Not sure what I feel here. We (except for God, Jesus, possibly Mary, and some others) are all sinners. I am a great sinner myself. Still, for Catholics, today Is Divine Mercy Sunday, and even if (most) everyone deserves hell, I'm sure that God through His Infinite Mercy will forgive as many as are truly sorry and penitential. So, please, forgive each other in the name of God or whatever Divinity you believe in!!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mWRsgZuwf_8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mWRsgZuwf_8
Saturday, April 26, 2014
Sunday, January 19, 2014
Truth-making and Reference-making: Revised and Expanded
The problem of how best to explain the truth-making relation is a vexed one for truth-maker theory. As Raimi points out in his introductory survey, theories of this relation face four main difficulties:An adequate definition of the truth-maker relation must satisfy at least four conditions. It should not fall victim to any of the following problems: (i) the problem of counterintuitive truth-makers; (ii) the problem of excluded truth-makers; (iii) the problem of missing truth-makers; and (iv) the problem of unnecessary truth-makers. A definition falls victim to the first problem if it classifies as truth-makers for a certain proposition entities that are intuitively not truth-makers for this proposition. It falls victim to the second problem if it fails to classify as a truth-maker for a certain proposition an entity that intuitively is a truth-maker for this proposition. It falls victim to the third problem if it fails to account for any truth-maker for a certain proposition that intuitively has a truth-maker. Finally, it falls victim to the fourth problem if it classifies a truth-maker for a proposition that intuitively has no truth-maker. (Truth and Truth-Making, pp 13-4)In this paper I propose an account which I hope will not succumb to any of these problems. Section 2 sketches a couple of the major accounts that have been given of the truth-making relation, and explains what their problems are. In Section 3 I explain the basic ideas behind my own proposal, where I introduce the idea of reference-making, and use it to account for the idea of truth-making for subject-predicate sentences, taking a truth-maker to be a reference-maker for a sentence. In Section 4, I give a quasi-formal account of how it can be applied to truth-functional compounds, quantified sentences, and modal sentences. Section 5 gives a reply to Greg Restall’s arguments that logical considerations lead quickly to the trivialization of the truth-making relation: that everything is a truth-maker for every true truth-bearer. I show that this does not hold for my approach, and in the process show how it avoids problem (i). Next, in Section 6 I discuss some of its philosophical implications. Then, in Section 7, I show how my account, contrary to first appearance, can be tweaked to avoid truth value gaps. Section 8 answers objections to my views. Finally, I conclude the paper in Section 9.
Thursday, January 09, 2014
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