Sometimes A Thought: Alfred Tarski, "The Semantic Definition of Truth"

[Jeffrey Rubard]

The Semantic Conception of Truth and the Foundations of Semantics Alfred Tarski, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 4, pp. 341-376 (1944).

This paper consists of two parts; the first has an expository character, and the second is rather polemical.

In the first part I want to summarize in an informal way the main results of my investigations concerning the definition of truth and the more general problem of the foundations of semantics. These results have been embodied in a work which appeared in print several years ago.1 Although my investigations concern concepts dealt with is classical philosophy, they happen to be comparatively little known in philosophical circles, perhaps because of their strictly technical character. For this reason I hope I shall be excused for taking up the matter once again.

2 Since my work was published, various objections, of unequal value, have been raised to my investigations; some of these appeared in print, and others were made in public and private discussions in which I took part.3

In the second part of the paper I should like to express my views regarding these objections. I hope that the remarks which will be made in this context will not be considered as purely polemical in character, but will be found to contain some constructive contributions to the subject. In the second part of the paper I have made extensive use of material graciously put at my disposal by Dr. Marja Kokoszynska (University of Lwow). I am especially indebted and grateful to Professors Ernest Nagel (Columbia University) and David Rynin (University of California, Berkeley) for their help in preparing the final text and for various critical remarks.

I. EXPOSITION 1. THE MAIN PROBLEM -- A SATISFACTORY DEFINITION OF TRUTH.

Our discussion will be centered around the notion4 of truth. The main problem is that of giving a satisfactory definition of this notion, i.e., a definition which is materially adequate and formally correct. But such a formulation of the problem, because of its generality, cannot be considered unequivocal, and requires some further comments.

In order to avoid any ambiguity, we must first specify the conditions under which the definition of truth will be considered adequate from the material point of view. The desired definition does not aim to specify the meaning of a familiar word used to denote a novel notion; on the contrary, it aims to catch hold of the actual meaning of an old notion. We must then characterize this notion precisely enough to enable anyone to determine whether the definition actually fulfills its task.

Secondly, we must determine on what the formal correctness of the definition depends. Thus, we must specify the words or concepts which we wish to use in defining the notion of truth; and 1 we must also give the formal rules to which the definition should conform. Speaking more generally, we must describe the formal structure of the language in which the definition will be given.

The discussion of these points will occupy a considerable portion of the first part of the paper.

2. THE EXTENSION OF THE TERM "TRUE."

We begin with some remarks regarding the extension of the concept of truth which we have in mind here.

The predicate "true" is sometimes used to refer to psychological phenomena such as judgments or beliefs, sometimes to certain physical objects, namely, linguistic expressions and specifically sentences, and sometimes to certain ideal entities called "propositions." By "sentence" we understand here what is usually meant in grammar by "declarative sentence"; as regards the term "proposition," its meaning is notoriously a subject of lengthy disputations by various philosophers and logicians, and it seems never to have been made quite clear and unambiguous. For several reasons it appears most convenient to apply the term "true" to sentences, and we shall follow this course.5

Consequently, we must always relate the notion of truth, like that of a sentence, to a specific language; for it is obvious that the same expression which is a true sentence in one language can be false or meaningless in another.

Of course, the fact that we are interested here primarily in the notion of truth for sentences does not exclude the possibility of a subsequent extension of this notion to other kinds of objects.

3. THE MEANING OF THE TERM "TRUE."

Much more serious difficulties are connected with the problem of the meaning (or the intension) of the concept of truth.

The word "true," like other words from our everyday language, is certainly not unambiguous. And it does not seem to me that the philosophers who have discussed this concept have helped to diminish its ambiguity. In works and discussions of philosophers we meet many different conceptions of truth and falsity, and we must indicate which conception will be the basis of our discussion.

We should like our definition to do justice to the intuitions which adhere to the classical Aristotelian conception of truth -- intuitions which find their expression in the well-known words of Aristotle's Metaphysics: To say of what is that it is not, or of what is not that it is, is false, while to say of what is that it is, or of what is not that it is not, is true.

2 If we wished to adapt ourselves to modern philosophical terminology, we could perhaps express this conception by means of the familiar formula The truth of a sentence consists in its agreement with (or correspondence to) reality. (For a theory of truth which is to be based upon the latter formulation the term "correspondence theory" has been suggested.)

If, on the other band, we should decide to extend the popular usage of the term "designate" by applying it not only to names, but also to sentences, and if we agreed to speak of the designata of sentences as "states of affairs," we could possibly use for the same purpose the following phrase: A sentence is true if it designates an existing state of affairs.6

However, all these formulations can lead to various misunderstandings, for none of them is sufficiently precise and clear (though this applies much less to the original Aristotelian formulation than to either of the others); at any rate, none of them can be considered a satisfactory definition of truth. It is up to us to look for a more precise expression of our intuitions.

4. A CRITERION FOR THE MATERIAL ADEQUACY OF THE DEFINITION.7

Let us start with a concrete example. Consider the sentence "snow is white." We ask the question under what conditions this sentence is true or false. It seems clear that if we base ourselves on the classical conception of truth, we shall say that the sentence is true if snow is white, and that it is false if snow is not white.

Thus, if the definition of truth is to conform to our conception, it must imply the following equivalence: The sentence "snow is white" is true if, and only if, snow is white.

Let me point out that the phrase "snow is white" occurs on the left side of this equivalence in quotation marks, and on the right without quotation marks. On the right side we have the sentence itself, and on the left the name of the sentence. Employing the medieval logical terminology we could also say that on the right side the words "snow is white" occur in suppositio formalis, and on the left in suppositio materialis. It is hardly necessary to explain why we must have the name of the sentence, and not the sentence itself, on the left side of the equivalence.

For, in the first place, from the point of view of the grammar of our language, an expression of the form "X is true" will not become a meaningful sentence if we replace in it 'X' by a sentence or by anything other than a name -- since the subject of a sentence may be only a noun or an expression functioning like a noun. And, in the second place, the fundamental conventions regarding the use of any language require that in any utterance we make about an object it is the name of the object which must be employed, and not the object itself. In consequence, if we wish to say something about a sentence, for example, that it is true, we must use the name of this sentence, and not the sentence itself.8

3 It may be added that enclosing a sentence in quotation marks is by no means the only way of forming its name. For instance, by assuming the usual order of letters in our alphabet, we can use the following expression as the name (the description) of the sentence "snow is white":

the sentence constituted by three words, the first of which consists of the 19th, 14th, 15th, and 23rd letters, the second of the 9th and 19th letters, and the third of the 23rd, 8th, 9th, 20th, and 5th letters of the English alphabet.

We shall now generalize the procedure which we have applied above. Let us consider an arbitrary sentence; we shall replace it by the letter 'p.' We form the name of this sentence and we replace it by another letter, say 'X.' We ask now what is the logical relation between the two sentences "X is true" and 'p.' It is clear that from the point of view of our basic conception of truth these sentences are equivalent. In other words, the following equivalence holds:

(T) X is true if, and only if, p. We shall call any such equivalence (with 'p' replaced by any sentence of the language to which the word "true" refers, and 'X' replaced by a name of this sentence) an "equivalence of the form (T)."

Now at last we are able to put into a precise form the conditions under which we will consider the usage and the definition of the term "true" as adequate from the material point of view: we wish to use the term "true" in such a way that all equivalences of the form (T) can be asserted, and we shall call a definition of truth "adequate" if all these equivalences follow from it.

It should be emphasized that neither the expression (T) itself (which is not a sentence, but only a schema of a sentence) nor any particular instance of the form (T) can be regarded as a definition of truth. We can only say that every equivalence of the form (T) obtained by replacing 'p' by a particular sentence, and 'X' by a name of this sentence, may be considered a partial definition of truth, which explains wherein the truth of this one individual sentence consists. The general definition has to be, in a certain sense, a logical conjunction of all these partial definitions.

(The last remark calls for some comments. A language may admit the construction of infinitely many sentences; and thus the number of partial definitions of truth referring to sentences of such a language will also be infinite. Hence to give our remark a precise sense we should have to explain what is meant by a "logical conjunction of infinitely many sentences"; but this would lead us too far into technical problems of modern logic.)

5. TRUTH AS A SEMANTIC CONCEPT.

I should like to propose the name "the semantic conception of truth" for the conception of truth which has just been discussed.

Semantics is a discipline which, speaking loosely, deals with certain relations between expressions of a language and the objects (or "states of affairs") "referred to" by those 4 expressions. As typical examples of semantic concepts we may mention the concepts of designation, satisfaction, and definition as these occur in the following examples:

the expression "the father of his country" designates (denotes) George Washington;

snow satisfies the sentential function (the condition) "2 is white";

the equation "2 . x = 1" defines (uniquely determines) the number 1/2.

While the words "designates," "satisfies," and "defines" express relations (between certain expressions and the objects "referred to" by these expressions), the word "true" is of a different logical nature: it expresses a property (or denotes a class) of certain expressions, viz, of sentences. However, it is easily seen that all the formulations which were given earlier and which aimed to explain the meaning of this word (cf. Sections 3 and 4) referred not only to sentences themselves, but also to objects "talked about" by these sentences, or possibly to "states of affairs" described by them. And, moreover, it turns out that the simplest and the most natural way of obtaining an exact definition of truth is one which involves the use of other semantic notions, e.g., the notion of satisfaction. It is for these reasons that we count the concept of truth which is discussed here among the concepts of semantics, and the problem of defining truth proves to be closely related to the more general problem of setting up the foundations of theoretical semantics.

It is perhaps worth while saying that semantics as it is conceived in this paper (and in former papers of the author) is a sober and modest discipline which has no pretensions of being a universal patent-medicine for all the ills and diseases of mankind, whether imaginary or real. You will not find in semantics any remedy for decayed teeth or illusions of grandeur or class conflicts. Nor is semantics a device for establishing that everyone except the speaker and his friends is speaking nonsense.

From antiquity to the present day the concepts of semantics have played an important role in the discussions of philosophers, logicians, and philologists. Nevertheless, these concepts have been treated for a long time with a certain amount of suspicion. From a historical standpoint, this suspicion is to be regarded as completely justified. For although the meaning of semantic concepts as they are used in everyday language seems to be rather clear and understandable, still all attempts to characterize this meaning in a general and exact way miscarried. And what is worse, various arguments in which these concepts were involved, and which seemed otherwise quite correct and based upon apparently obvious premises, led frequently to paradoxes and antinomies. It is sufficient to mention here the antinomy of the liar, Richard's antinomy of definability (by means of a finite number of words), and Grelling-Nelson's antinomy of heterological terms.

[...]

[pataphor]

On Mon, 13 Dec 2021 09:37:03 -0800 (PST)
Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:

> The Semantic Conception of Truth and the Foundations of Semantics
> Alfred Tarski, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 4, pp.
> 341-376 (1944).

It's not quite clear to me whether you are just quoting Tarski or
somehow channeling him, but one thing at least is clear to me: However
nice he is trying to be, he (or you?) is wrong in stating that snow is
white, as exemplified by the thought experiment of simply illuminating
the snow with only red light, making it only reflect that same light to
our eyes, thus making it seem (or be?) red.

This leads me to the importance of context for meaning, and I don't
mean that in a semantic sense, or whatever Tarski is trying, to salvage
at least part of his "truth" fascination. What happens before, matters,
what is likely, given the circumstances, matters, in what light a thing
is viewed, matters.

In fact this is one of the ways Chomsky and I went our different
philosophical ways, not that I have ever met him physically, as I don't
believe it to be possible to write some kind of computer program to
parse a sentence in such a way that it still captures all that it means
in the endlessly variable contexts that it is produced in, or read,
hopefully by some intelligent creator and perceiver, or even by some
advanced computer program, that still later might change its "mind", if
new facts emerge or disappear, putting the whole thing at odds with
whatever was thought about it.

Actually, a few years later I was in a friend's (a mathematician's)
office when I saw a few of his books about Chomsky's theories about
language in his bookshelves, and we both had different ways of
appreciating him, he appreciating him because of his formal models, and
I, after concluding years before that "it didn't work" when trying to
write parsers that way, appreciating him more about his political
analyses.

But even those "truths" have now been altered, as it seems that if one
just adds more dukkha to the power of computer programs, they become
almost as lifelike as the impossible inhabitants of Searle's "Chinese
room", and also, after reading and watching a lot of stuff from
Chomsky, I must say, while still greatly admiring him, he doesn't seem
to offer many viable alternatives, even while 100% (or at least it
seems so to me) correct in weeding out the falsehoods that appear in
politics.

So, all we seem to have is some ever shifting sense of truth, given the
situation, and us ever changing along with it, not knowing what the
truth will be like later, and also not knowing, or having forgotten,
what it used to be. I don't blame Chomsky for it, or Tarski, because
who knows, they might become, or have been right, at least for a moment,
or in some parallel universe.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

Is "pataphor" a dumb-ass reference to Sellarsianism? Sellars' theory of
semantics was different than Tarski's. Snow is white, too.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

I've met Chomsky before, or at least been in the same place with him physically.
He's not terribly nice, and that's not a terribly "legible" version of his views, either.

[pataphor]

Wasn't Sellars trying to prove he wasn't a behaviorist, by proving he
was a behaviorist, by attacking the "myth of the given" after first
putting it in a black box?

About snow being white: Just because you hang a label onto something, it
doesn't mean the label is part of the thing, a property of the thing,
or even the thing itself.

A pataphor is to a metaphor, what a metaphor is to a phenomenon.

Suppose I use the metaphor of a sabre tooth tiger for the phenomenon of
you hiding behind Tarski and going for the jugular (e.g. the ad hominem
of suggesting dumb-ass references) when someone passes by.

A pataphor would notice that Tarski, like many logicians, prefers the
metaphorical "end game", as in chess, over the middle game, as it
seems he can't move soon enough to a situation more amenable to
computation and formal logic.

But being unable to do that, his progress has stalled. Having
become a static object means it would become a good situation for
someone to hide behind.

As the sabre tooth tiger attacks, Tarski now notices the game
is progressing and he starts to look out again for chances to quickly
move to an end game.

The pataphor notices that the situation has changed too, and concludes
that, since the bishop is the only piece with a big mouth, it means the
sabre tooth tiger has now become a bishop.

He remembers that everything is not identical to what we have labeled it
as, like Korzybski thought, and, since the only piece that can show that
in chess, is the pawn, he concludes he is a pawn now.

Since things have become this way, the only thing he can do is promote.

He promotes himself to a queen, thereby waking up the Tarski completely.

[pataphor]

Have you seen this video? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AkXK2CqB3No

As of now I've only watched the first thirty minutes of it, but this
switch from sentence parsers to universal grammar, in the sense of it
being some kind of general blueprint for speech seems like a cop out to
me.

On the other hand, the way I met Chomsky's theory was by having to write
lisp programs that labeled certain elements of sentences grammatically,
and that didn't work. It could very well be that Chomsky himself
would balk at being associated with it, and in that case there wasn't a
switch at all and I am just imagining things. Or maybe that kind of
thing works well now since it would seem hard to translate stuff
without it, even though there is no 1 to 1 mapping of language
structures between different languages.

On the third hand, in the video it seems he is still working towards
simplifying things, even after he knew that Goedel shows that there are
things one cannot prove right or wrong unless one adds new axioms. To
me this implies that one can't definitely generate language, or even
intelligence, recursively, as one has to make decisions along the way
all the time, some of which might have to invalidate earlier axioms,
like going from straight line logic to logic that applies to curved
lines.

And sure, dropping axioms might seem to make things easier, but it also
undermines the idea that one can create an universal grammar, if it
means it can still change all the time. Unless there is some kind of
ratcheting effect, but then one would start to wonder about how hard
civilization would fall if one built the towers of abstraction too
high and something essential from a lower level was left out.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

On Thursday, December 16, 2021 at 1:44:23 AM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:
> On Wed, 15 Dec 2021 07:30:17 -0800 (PST)
> Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > I've met Chomsky before, or at least been in the same place with him
> > physically. He's not terribly nice, and that's not a terribly
> > "legible" version of his views, either.
> Have you seen this video? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AkXK2CqB3No
>
> As of now I've only watched the first thirty minutes of it, but this
> switch from sentence parsers to universal grammar, in the sense of it
> being some kind of general blueprint for speech seems like a cop out to
> me.

Yeah, I, uh, gotta say, there's such a thing as "talking down" to an issue.

> On the other hand, the way I met Chomsky's theory was by having to write
> lisp programs that labeled certain elements of sentences grammatically,
> and that didn't work. It could very well be that Chomsky himself
> would balk at being associated with it, and in that case there wasn't a
> switch at all and I am just imagining things. Or maybe that kind of
> thing works well now since it would seem hard to translate stuff
> without it, even though there is no 1 to 1 mapping of language
> structures between different languages.

Maybe particularly when the issue is "orthogonal"? Lisp is based on
Church's lambda calculus, not Chomsky's work at all. McCarthy is
no longer alive to ask about this, but probably said something on
the topic once.

> On the third hand, in the video it seems he is still working towards
> simplifying things, even after he knew that Goedel shows that there are
> things one cannot prove right or wrong unless one adds new axioms. To
> me this implies that one can't definitely generate language, or even
> intelligence, recursively, as one has to make decisions along the way
> all the time, some of which might have to invalidate earlier axioms,
> like going from straight line logic to logic that applies to curved
> lines.

Uh, y'know, uh, I'm not sure where the Second Incompleteness Theorem
comes into the discussion, or non-Euclidean geometry. Does Tarski's
proof of the non-arithmetizability of truth suggest the Second Incompleteness
Theorem to you? At any rate, it wasn't in the selection from "The Semantic Definition
of Truth" I posted.

> And sure, dropping axioms might seem to make things easier, but it also
> undermines the idea that one can create an universal grammar, if it
> means it can still change all the time. Unless there is some kind of
> ratcheting effect, but then one would start to wonder about how hard
> civilization would fall if one built the towers of abstraction too
> high and something essential from a lower level was left out.

Now, there's a point. Writing "an universal grammar" rather than "a
universal grammar" is a bit deep (I don't happen to know the real
rules for "an" in this context. Do you know I even ignore the
"who/whom" distinction as much as possible?) The rest of it I don't
follow. "Towers of Hanoi"? They're still standing, right? Important
these days.

[pataphor]

On Thu, 16 Dec 2021 23:07:44 -0800 (PST)
Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Thursday, December 16, 2021 at 1:44:23 AM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:

[...]

> > this switch from sentence parsers to universal grammar, in the
> > sense of it being some kind of general blueprint for speech seems
> > like a cop out to me.
>
> Yeah, I, uh, gotta say, there's such a thing as "talking down" to an
> issue.

I'm assuming this means you support my statement, but I can't shake the
feeling that I'm reading it wrong and you mean this in the sense of
me taking (talking?) down an icon, while he's still alive and kicking,
producing solid content every day. Maybe we can wait a few years and
he'd never have to experience all this awkwardness?

> > On the other hand, the way I met Chomsky's theory was by having to
> > write lisp programs that labeled certain elements of sentences
> > grammatically, and that didn't work. It could very well be that
> > Chomsky himself would balk at being associated with it, and in that
> > case there wasn't a switch at all and I am just imagining things.
> > Or maybe that kind of thing works well now since it would seem hard
> > to translate stuff without it, even though there is no 1 to 1
> > mapping of language structures between different languages.
>
> Maybe particularly when the issue is "orthogonal"? Lisp is based on
> Church's lambda calculus, not Chomsky's work at all. McCarthy is
> no longer alive to ask about this, but probably said something on
> the topic once.

Right, this happened a long time ago, and in those days things were
still less orthogonal than today. But we weren't barbarians altogether,
capable of doing factor analysis and stuff. Maybe it's just a matter of
the future being unevenly distributed.

Anyway, focusing on lisp was not my intention, rather what I
insufficiently clearly tried to talk about was that cultural icons
might have gone through phases when they were embarking on dead ends,
and still inspiring some of their followers to send some of their
students into the weeds using their theories. One of my teachers being
one of those followers.

Imagine what kind of stellar lisp programmer I could have become weren't
it for that initial negative experience. I mean, Wolfram has nothing on
me. And Lisp wasn't a bad programming language for that time, maybe
for all time, if we can believe McCarthy, as we were all stumbling
around trying to use weird variants of fortran.

Come to think about it, maybe Chomsky himself was sent into the weeds
by McCarthy, with this "universal grammar" thing. If only that hadn't
happened, the consequences would have been even greater.

As things are now, having left the optimal imprinting age period for
computer languages, one could only take dynamic typing from my cold
dead hands.

> > On the third hand, in the video it seems he is still working
> > towards simplifying things, even after he knew that Goedel shows
> > that there are things one cannot prove right or wrong unless one
> > adds new axioms. To me this implies that one can't definitely
> > generate language, or even intelligence, recursively, as one has to
> > make decisions along the way all the time, some of which might have
> > to invalidate earlier axioms, like going from straight line logic
> > to logic that applies to curved lines.
>
> Uh, y'know, uh, I'm not sure where the Second Incompleteness Theorem
> comes into the discussion, or non-Euclidean geometry. Does Tarski's
> proof of the non-arithmetizability of truth suggest the Second
> Incompleteness Theorem to you? At any rate, it wasn't in the
> selection from "The Semantic Definition of Truth" I posted.

Did you mean this https://wiki2.org/en/Tarski%27s_undefinability_theorem

Seems they were all chummies, until McGoedel accidentally blew up the
van he had them all gathered in, as a strike force to deter some c*nth
from starting the singularity early.

They didn't conclude from Goedel's result that maybe they should strike
some of their axioms, as that was frowned upon in those days, and still
is, mostly in the exact sciences. I'm thinking about mixing
hierarchical levels here specifically. We won't get rid of that fallacy
until we decouple reproduction from status, but the work around until
then is to just signal low status all the time so one hasn't much to
lose to begin with.

> > And sure, dropping axioms might seem to make things easier, but it
> > also undermines the idea that one can create an universal grammar,
> > if it means it can still change all the time. Unless there is some
> > kind of ratcheting effect, but then one would start to wonder about
> > how hard civilization would fall if one built the towers of
> > abstraction too high and something essential from a lower level was
> > left out.
>
> Now, there's a point. Writing "an universal grammar" rather than "a
> universal grammar" is a bit deep (I don't happen to know the real
> rules for "an" in this context. Do you know I even ignore the
> "who/whom" distinction as much as possible?) The rest of it I don't
> follow. "Towers of Hanoi"? They're still standing, right? Important
> these days.

Maybe it's like this
https://troynikov.io/content/images/2020/12/415F6A2F-7F5D-4284-AC5B-0A5F85E36E15.jpeg

Unfortunately I don't have the AI to turn this into a moving 3D image
where the various truth subsets become bubbles orbiting some truth
"planet" or, why not, a truth sun. That way it would become clearer
that truth is not universal, but local.

As to what a tower of abstraction is, it's simply a caged pataphor,
but, for obvious reasons, I won't go much deeper into that.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

Yeah, kinda don't. Don't. Kinda. Kinda don't. Goedel, Tarski, and Church
were all famous for being "selfsame" in that Kierkegaardian way, only
the results were not terribly charming (crazy/aggravating/unbearable).
So it's not them we're speaking of, and maybe nobody in particular.

> Imagine what kind of stellar lisp programmer I could have become weren't
> it for that initial negative experience. I mean, Wolfram has nothing on
> me. And Lisp wasn't a bad programming language for that time, maybe
> for all time, if we can believe McCarthy, as we were all stumbling
> around trying to use weird variants of fortran.
>
> Come to think about it, maybe Chomsky himself was sent into the weeds
> by McCarthy, with this "universal grammar" thing. If only that hadn't
> happened, the consequences would have been even greater.

They did know each other, I suppose; it wasn't all about Zellig Harris.
McCarthy was not exactly a linguist, though.

> As things are now, having left the optimal imprinting age period for
> computer languages, one could only take dynamic typing from my cold
> dead hands.
> > > On the third hand, in the video it seems he is still working
> > > towards simplifying things, even after he knew that Goedel shows
> > > that there are things one cannot prove right or wrong unless one
> > > adds new axioms. To me this implies that one can't definitely
> > > generate language, or even intelligence, recursively, as one has to
> > > make decisions along the way all the time, some of which might have
> > > to invalidate earlier axioms, like going from straight line logic
> > > to logic that applies to curved lines.
> >
> > Uh, y'know, uh, I'm not sure where the Second Incompleteness Theorem
> > comes into the discussion, or non-Euclidean geometry. Does Tarski's
> > proof of the non-arithmetizability of truth suggest the Second
> > Incompleteness Theorem to you? At any rate, it wasn't in the
> > selection from "The Semantic Definition of Truth" I posted.
> Did you mean this https://wiki2.org/en/Tarski%27s_undefinability_theorem
>
> Seems they were all chummies, until McGoedel accidentally blew up the
> van he had them all gathered in, as a strike force to deter some c*nth
> from starting the singularity early.

Dude, it sounds like you've been talking to Beto O'Rourke. Stop.

> They didn't conclude from Goedel's result that maybe they should strike
> some of their axioms, as that was frowned upon in those days, and still
> is, mostly in the exact sciences. I'm thinking about mixing
> hierarchical levels here specifically. We won't get rid of that fallacy
> until we decouple reproduction from status, but the work around until
> then is to just signal low status all the time so one hasn't much to
> lose to begin with.
> > > And sure, dropping axioms might seem to make things easier, but it
> > > also undermines the idea that one can create an universal grammar,
> > > if it means it can still change all the time. Unless there is some
> > > kind of ratcheting effect, but then one would start to wonder about
> > > how hard civilization would fall if one built the towers of
> > > abstraction too high and something essential from a lower level was
> > > left out.
> >
> > Now, there's a point. Writing "an universal grammar" rather than "a
> > universal grammar" is a bit deep (I don't happen to know the real
> > rules for "an" in this context. Do you know I even ignore the
> > "who/whom" distinction as much as possible?) The rest of it I don't
> > follow. "Towers of Hanoi"? They're still standing, right? Important
> > these days.

> Unfortunately I don't have the AI to turn this into a moving 3D image
> where the various truth subsets become bubbles orbiting some truth
> "planet" or, why not, a truth sun. That way it would become clearer
> that truth is not universal, but local.

Oh, a sheaf semanticist! I never did understand that theory, myself.

> As to what a tower of abstraction is, it's simply a caged pataphor,
> but, for obvious reasons, I won't go much deeper into that.

Maxwell, this hammer isn't quite that silver. I had to work on
"ominous nonsense" at an earlier age, myself.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

NB: You pretty much don't ask a platinum-level Pere Ubu stan to grade
your thoughts, at least "supposed", on supposed "pataphor".
(Non-Alignment Pact? *Already signed*.)

[Jeffrey Rubard]

You out there, buddy? Thinkin' all your thoughts?
That's fantastic.

[pataphor]

Just overwhelmed. You realize no one ever posts here except me, for at
least a few years? It's like I'm Robinson Crusoe and you're Friday.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

Oh, you're a racist fantasist about imperialism and you can't tell me apart from Rosalind Russell?

[pataphor]

On Tue, 21 Dec 2021 08:57:59 -0800 (PST)

Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Monday, December 20, 2021 at 10:04:08 AM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:
> > On Mon, 20 Dec 2021 07:20:25 -0800 (PST)
> > Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > > You out there, buddy? Thinkin' all your thoughts?
> > > That's fantastic.
> > Just overwhelmed. You realize no one ever posts here except me, for
> > at least a few years? It's like I'm Robinson Crusoe and you're
> > Friday.
>
> Oh, you're a racist fantasist about imperialism and you can't tell me
> apart from Rosalind Russell?

Not really a racist fantasist, but merely a member of the rudest and
most direct culture on the planet.

So you're actually a girl threatening to marry some boring bureaucrat,
unless I manage to interest you in one last assignment?

This wouldn't be the first time it happened to me, but it never worked.
Unlike most men who are categorically unable to change their
preferences once they are engrossed in their formulations, (no, not even
bayesians!) I still have a vestigial functional capacity for it. It's
nothing like women can do, changing their mind on the fly, very
different from most men, who will suffer the rest of their lives after a
breakup, while it only takes me a decade or so.

But as horribly as that female superiority is abused, it still offers
hope for a correction to Tarski's flawed approach to truth, as it kind
of follows that once one's preferences change, the truth follows all
along, which would be obvious to any woman but not to many men.

Even as I despise the technique, and would therefore not do unto others
what I don't like being done to me, paradoxically, and because even if
conditioned by feelings it still doesn't mean one can't indirectly
change the truth via mastery of the change of one's preferences, kind
of being able to 'move around' in that space, I would ask of you to let
go of Rosalind and go in the direction of Heilein's Friday.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

On Tuesday, December 21, 2021 at 12:22:17 PM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:
> On Tue, 21 Dec 2021 08:57:59 -0800 (PST)
> Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > On Monday, December 20, 2021 at 10:04:08 AM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:
> > > On Mon, 20 Dec 2021 07:20:25 -0800 (PST)
> > > Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > > You out there, buddy? Thinkin' all your thoughts?
> > > > That's fantastic.
> > > Just overwhelmed. You realize no one ever posts here except me, for
> > > at least a few years? It's like I'm Robinson Crusoe and you're
> > > Friday.
> >
> > Oh, you're a racist fantasist about imperialism and you can't tell me
> > apart from Rosalind Russell?
> Not really a racist fantasist, but merely a member of the rudest and
> most direct culture on the planet.

No, y'are. Nobody but nobody brings up "Friday" from Robinson Crusoe
except as an entree to blackface caricatures, just empirically.
Furthermore, I don't think your "lead-ons" really necessarily lead on
to what you're talking about. Anthropologically speaking, I think
Micronesians and some other Southeast Asians tend to strike people
as the brusquest culture; I suppose you are white, though, and a
confused white as you mean to say you are "English" but do not recognize
a joke about confusing the (English) Cary Grant with the (Canadianesque)
Rosalind Russell, stars of *His Girl Friday*.

"WASP"? "Redneck with greenbacks"? Acceptable
alternatives.

> So you're actually a girl threatening to marry some boring bureaucrat,
> unless I manage to interest you in one last assignment?

She might be interested. Do you have a record of sex crimes convictions?
How's your "physical health"?

> This wouldn't be the first time it happened to me, but it never worked.
> Unlike most men who are categorically unable to change their
> preferences once they are engrossed in their formulations, (no, not even
> bayesians!) I still have a vestigial functional capacity for it. It's
> nothing like women can do, changing their mind on the fly, very
> different from most men, who will suffer the rest of their lives after a
> breakup, while it only takes me a decade or so.

Ehh, whatever.

> But as horribly as that female superiority is abused, it still offers
> hope for a correction to Tarski's flawed approach to truth, as it kind
> of follows that once one's preferences change, the truth follows all
> along, which would be obvious to any woman but not to many men.

I'm not sure I can sign Helena Rasiowa up for this.

> Even as I despise the technique, and would therefore not do unto others
> what I don't like being done to me, paradoxically, and because even if
> conditioned by feelings it still doesn't mean one can't indirectly
> change the truth via mastery of the change of one's preferences, kind
> of being able to 'move around' in that space, I would ask of you to let
> go of Rosalind and go in the direction of Heilein's Friday.

*Heinlein*.

[pataphor]

On Tue, 21 Dec 2021 19:22:32 -0800 (PST)
Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Tuesday, December 21, 2021 at 12:22:17 PM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:

[...]

> > > > Just overwhelmed. You realize no one ever posts here except me,
> > > > for at least a few years? It's like I'm Robinson Crusoe and
> > > > you're Friday.
> > >
> > > Oh, you're a racist fantasist about imperialism and you can't
> > > tell me apart from Rosalind Russell?
> > Not really a racist fantasist, but merely a member of the rudest
> > and most direct culture on the planet.
>
> No, y'are. Nobody but nobody brings up "Friday" from Robinson Crusoe
> except as an entree to blackface caricatures, just empirically.
> Furthermore, I don't think your "lead-ons" really necessarily lead on
> to what you're talking about. Anthropologically speaking, I think
> Micronesians and some other Southeast Asians tend to strike people
> as the brusquest culture; I suppose you are white, though, and a
> confused white as you mean to say you are "English" but do not
> recognize a joke about confusing the (English) Cary Grant with the
> (Canadianesque) Rosalind Russell, stars of *His Girl Friday*.
>
> "WASP"? "Redneck with greenbacks"? Acceptable
> alternatives.

To be fair, I don't think you got my mcgruber reference.

> > So you're actually a girl threatening to marry some boring
> > bureaucrat, unless I manage to interest you in one last assignment?
> >
>
> She might be interested. Do you have a record of sex crimes
> convictions? How's your "physical health"?

This is all very tentative and metaphorical. I'd never advise anyone to
try it at home.

> I'm not sure I can sign Helena Rasiowa up for this.

Do I have to integrate yet another one? You seem to be kind of high
maintenance.

> > Even as I despise the technique, and would therefore not do unto
> > others what I don't like being done to me, paradoxically, and
> > because even if conditioned by feelings it still doesn't mean one
> > can't indirectly change the truth via mastery of the change of
> > one's preferences, kind of being able to 'move around' in that
> > space, I would ask of you to let go of Rosalind and go in the
> > direction of Heilein's Friday.
>
> *Heinlein*.

Yeah, he had many flaws, one of those might even have propagated up. But
I never said "follow him all the way". Just close your eyes and think of
Nietzsche's superman.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

On Wednesday, December 22, 2021 at 2:34:54 AM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:
> On Tue, 21 Dec 2021 19:22:32 -0800 (PST)
> Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > On Tuesday, December 21, 2021 at 12:22:17 PM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:
> [...]
> > > > > Just overwhelmed. You realize no one ever posts here except me,
> > > > > for at least a few years? It's like I'm Robinson Crusoe and
> > > > > you're Friday.
> > > >
> > > > Oh, you're a racist fantasist about imperialism and you can't
> > > > tell me apart from Rosalind Russell?
> > > Not really a racist fantasist, but merely a member of the rudest
> > > and most direct culture on the planet.
> >
> > No, y'are. Nobody but nobody brings up "Friday" from Robinson Crusoe
> > except as an entree to blackface caricatures, just empirically.
> > Furthermore, I don't think your "lead-ons" really necessarily lead on
> > to what you're talking about. Anthropologically speaking, I think
> > Micronesians and some other Southeast Asians tend to strike people
> > as the brusquest culture; I suppose you are white, though, and a
> > confused white as you mean to say you are "English" but do not
> > recognize a joke about confusing the (English) Cary Grant with the
> > (Canadianesque) Rosalind Russell, stars of *His Girl Friday*.
> >
> > "WASP"? "Redneck with greenbacks"? Acceptable
> > alternatives.

> To be fair, I don't think you got my mcgruber reference.

That is, I take it, not like "McClintock"? At any rate, I think
you're systematically confusing what kind of lame and ugly you
are.

> > > So you're actually a girl threatening to marry some boring
> > > bureaucrat, unless I manage to interest you in one last assignment?
> > >
> >
> > She might be interested. Do you have a record of sex crimes
> > convictions? How's your "physical health"?
> This is all very tentative and metaphorical. I'd never advise anyone to
> try it at home.

Sure dude, just keep up with the regimen if they tell you it's important
(Even psych meds are like that.)

> > I'm not sure I can sign Helena Rasiowa up for this.
> Do I have to integrate yet another one? You seem to be kind of high
> maintenance.

Not so with the belle dame of Middle European logic, I'm told.
She even had a passing interest in business management.
(But it's sorta like you're stupid if you don't connect the name to,
say, Tarski.)

> > > Even as I despise the technique, and would therefore not do unto
> > > others what I don't like being done to me, paradoxically, and
> > > because even if conditioned by feelings it still doesn't mean one
> > > can't indirectly change the truth via mastery of the change of
> > > one's preferences, kind of being able to 'move around' in that
> > > space, I would ask of you to let go of Rosalind and go in the
> > > direction of Heilein's Friday.
> >
> > *Heinlein*.
> Yeah, he had many flaws, one of those might even have propagated up. But
> I never said "follow him all the way". Just close your eyes and think of
> Nietzsche's superman.

Wow, that sounds like some sort of "pick up artist" talk nobody should ever
have to hear, and I'm pretty sure it's a direct fraud as an understanding of
Heinlein (I've met some of his relatives, don't care to expand on it though.)
Whatever the *Uebermensch* was supposed to be, and here you freight
me heavily as well, you're not it and "this isn't it" either.

[pataphor]

On Wed, 22 Dec 2021 09:10:01 -0800 (PST)

I don't know what you meant with McClintock, and it seems you still
don't get how I referenced McGruber. Maybe you should reread our earlier
sections of the sequences.

> > > > So you're actually a girl threatening to marry some boring
> > > > bureaucrat, unless I manage to interest you in one last
> > > > assignment?
> > >
> > > She might be interested. Do you have a record of sex crimes
> > > convictions? How's your "physical health"?
> > This is all very tentative and metaphorical. I'd never advise
> > anyone to try it at home.
>
> Sure dude, just keep up with the regimen if they tell you it's
> important (Even psych meds are like that.)

I don't know, they seem to have outsourced their thought processes to
the same organizations that won't propagate their messages if their
sentiment analysis fear or can't tell what the outcome might be.

> > > I'm not sure I can sign Helena Rasiowa up for this.
> > Do I have to integrate yet another one? You seem to be kind of high
> > maintenance.
>
> Not so with the belle dame of Middle European logic, I'm told.
> She even had a passing interest in business management.
> (But it's sorta like you're stupid if you don't connect the name to,
> say, Tarski.)

No wonder you think my references don't lead where I think they lead,
if even I don't agree with where you think I think they lead.

I simply hadn't looked up the latest addiction in your absolutely
unbiased list of famous women. Now I know however that she's partly
responsible for the fuzzy logic debacle they made me go through after
my first disappointments with the Chomsky method.

> > > > Even as I despise the technique, and would therefore not do
> > > > unto others what I don't like being done to me, paradoxically,
> > > > and because even if conditioned by feelings it still doesn't
> > > > mean one can't indirectly change the truth via mastery of the
> > > > change of one's preferences, kind of being able to 'move
> > > > around' in that space, I would ask of you to let go of Rosalind
> > > > and go in the direction of Heilein's Friday.
> > >
> > > *Heinlein*.
> > Yeah, he had many flaws, one of those might even have propagated
> > up. But I never said "follow him all the way". Just close your eyes
> > and think of Nietzsche's superman.
>
> Wow, that sounds like some sort of "pick up artist" talk nobody
> should ever have to hear, and I'm pretty sure it's a direct fraud as
> an understanding of Heinlein (I've met some of his relatives, don't
> care to expand on it though.) Whatever the *Uebermensch* was supposed
> to be, and here you freight me heavily as well, you're not it and
> "this isn't it" either.

To me its sounds like hell hath no fury ... and you're blinded by rage,
which actually seems like an upgrade to Tarski, especially since you
have managed to get past the content filters.

However as a truth finding mechanism it's as low as they go, on the
level of prediction markets, and still in some cases you might indeed
have to resort to capitalist controlled thought police companies to try
and find some place near to where you thought you started from, before
you lost your way.

Unfortunately, you might find out your country doesn't exist anymore,
because even a county like the US has only about 4% of the world
population, a p value distinctly less than .05 . Oh wait, who am I
kidding, of course they conclude nobody and nobody ever would think that
some things aren't associated they way they think they should be, so
they can go on with deleting everybody else's cultures and traditions,
for the single reason that some minority in their country is offended by
the idea they might be connected differently, while the rest of the
world looks at it wondering why everyone (American) involved seems to
get in a tailspin whenever something distantly related to the issue is
mentioned.

But I have it on good authority that the one true pairing between
Nietzsche's superman and Heinlein's Friday (obviously
irrelevantly, a discriminated female genius, among other things, of
unusual genetic make up) is on the rise.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

It's a famous movie, a comedy Western 'I suppose'. (The second comment is,
lowkey, one of those 'fake orders' people give nowadays?)

> > > > > So you're actually a girl threatening to marry some boring
> > > > > bureaucrat, unless I manage to interest you in one last
> > > > > assignment?
> > > >
> > > > She might be interested. Do you have a record of sex crimes
> > > > convictions? How's your "physical health"?
> > > This is all very tentative and metaphorical. I'd never advise
> > > anyone to try it at home.
> >
> > Sure dude, just keep up with the regimen if they tell you it's
> > important (Even psych meds are like that.)
> I don't know, they seem to have outsourced their thought processes to
> the same organizations that won't propagate their messages if their
> sentiment analysis fear or can't tell what the outcome might be.

Well, dude, I guess we know about the outcome of HIV infection.
Still, keep going with your meds if you need 'em, and wouldn't you?

> > > > I'm not sure I can sign Helena Rasiowa up for this.
> > > Do I have to integrate yet another one? You seem to be kind of high
> > > maintenance.
> >
> > Not so with the belle dame of Middle European logic, I'm told.
> > She even had a passing interest in business management.
> > (But it's sorta like you're stupid if you don't connect the name to,
> > say, Tarski.)
> No wonder you think my references don't lead where I think they lead,
> if even I don't agree with where you think I think they lead.

I... uh...

> I simply hadn't looked up the latest addiction in your absolutely
> unbiased list of famous women. Now I know however that she's partly
> responsible for the fuzzy logic debacle they made me go through after
> my first disappointments with the Chomsky method.
> > > > > Even as I despise the technique, and would therefore not do
> > > > > unto others what I don't like being done to me, paradoxically,
> > > > > and because even if conditioned by feelings it still doesn't
> > > > > mean one can't indirectly change the truth via mastery of the
> > > > > change of one's preferences, kind of being able to 'move
> > > > > around' in that space, I would ask of you to let go of Rosalind
> > > > > and go in the direction of Heilein's Friday.
> > > >
> > > > *Heinlein*.
> > > Yeah, he had many flaws, one of those might even have propagated
> > > up. But I never said "follow him all the way". Just close your eyes
> > > and think of Nietzsche's superman.
> >
> > Wow, that sounds like some sort of "pick up artist" talk nobody
> > should ever have to hear, and I'm pretty sure it's a direct fraud as
> > an understanding of Heinlein (I've met some of his relatives, don't
> > care to expand on it though.) Whatever the *Uebermensch* was supposed
> > to be, and here you freight me heavily as well, you're not it and
> > "this isn't it" either.
> To me its sounds like hell hath no fury ... and you're blinded by rage,
> which actually seems like an upgrade to Tarski, especially since you
> have managed to get past the content filters.

Shakespeare is not one of my favorite writers, and that's one of nobody's
favorite common, trite "borrowings" (misogyny stuff). In terms of 'content
filters', this is Usenet.

> However as a truth finding mechanism it's as low as they go, on the
> level of prediction markets, and still in some cases you might indeed
> have to resort to capitalist controlled thought police companies to try
> and find some place near to where you thought you started from, before
> you lost your way.
>
> Unfortunately, you might find out your country doesn't exist anymore,
> because even a county like the US has only about 4% of the world
> population, a p value distinctly less than .05 . Oh wait, who am I
> kidding, of course they conclude nobody and nobody ever would think that
> some things aren't associated they way they think they should be, so
> they can go on with deleting everybody else's cultures and traditions,
> for the single reason that some minority in their country is offended by
> the idea they might be connected differently, while the rest of the
> world looks at it wondering why everyone (American) involved seems to
> get in a tailspin whenever something distantly related to the issue is
> mentioned.

It's pretty substantially the United States I recognize in December 2021.
Not every side of that is positive. 'Deleting cultures and traditions' I'm
occasionally with in an anti-imperialist fashion, and frankly there are
some things to admire about a US mindset (Even compared to, say,
a Canadian mindset. Gavin McInnes! Am I right, or what?)

> But I have it on good authority that the one true pairing between
> Nietzsche's superman and Heinlein's Friday (obviously
> irrelevantly, a discriminated female genius, among other things, of
> unusual genetic make up) is on the rise.

My favorite thing about that one was the cover, so I canna really
get deep into this quickly 'postulated' admiration of the text.
(Personally I sometimes make a comparison between Lincoln
and the superman, but 'within the fold' of government service
that'd be a little obvious anyhow too.)

[Jeffrey Rubard]

Where'd you go?

[Jeffrey Rubard]

Did you decide 'pataphors' were too 'pat'?

[pataphor]

More like I was starting to suspect you're one of those people who'd
just delete most of the world population so your kind of sex becomes the
new normal.

And anyway, if you tell an American their equations are wrong, they're
just like "sucks to be you".

I mean, it's beyond rube.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

On Saturday, December 25, 2021 at 3:01:06 AM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:
> On Sat, 25 Dec 2021 01:12:53 -0800 (PST)
> Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > Where'd you go?
> >
> > Did you decide 'pataphors' were too 'pat'?
> More like I was starting to suspect you're one of those people who'd
> just delete most of the world population so your kind of sex becomes the
> new normal.

Did you know that the guys in Nomeansno are my cousins? So proud.
("Kill Everyone Now" was not seriously meant, SAC.)

> And anyway, if you tell an American their equations are wrong, they're
> just like "sucks to be you".

Well, if you're an HIV-positive sex criminal reliving their academic failure
through an Internet con that no longer works... never mind.

> I mean, it's beyond rube.

They used to think that neologism was a sign of mental illness.
I'm glad we've left those days behind.

[pataphor]

On Sun, 26 Dec 2021 23:42:27 -0800 (PST)

Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Saturday, December 25, 2021 at 3:01:06 AM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:
> > On Sat, 25 Dec 2021 01:12:53 -0800 (PST)
> > Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > > > Where'd you go?
> > >
> > > Did you decide 'pataphors' were too 'pat'?
> > More like I was starting to suspect you're one of those people
> > who'd just delete most of the world population so your kind of sex
> > becomes the new normal.
>
> Did you know that the guys in Nomeansno are my cousins? So proud.
> ("Kill Everyone Now" was not seriously meant, SAC.)

A long time a go I went to a nude beach with a girl friend. As I was
taking off my clothes, she objected "I don't want to see that". And I
was like "look this is a nude beach, everyone is naked". After all
this time maybe I understand her better now, but unfortunately she
emigrated to Costa Rica. Maybe I should go there too.

> > And anyway, if you tell an American their equations are wrong,
> > they're just like "sucks to be you".
>
> Well, if you're an HIV-positive sex criminal reliving their academic
> failure through an Internet con that no longer works... never mind.

How so? The only way not to lose is not to play. Works for sex too,
you should try it sometimes.

> > I mean, it's beyond rube.
>
> They used to think that neologism was a sign of mental illness.
> I'm glad we've left those days behind.

You seem to confabulate diseases on people that aren't there, is that
still in the DSM.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

On Monday, December 27, 2021 at 5:23:46 AM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:
> On Sun, 26 Dec 2021 23:42:27 -0800 (PST)
> Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > On Saturday, December 25, 2021 at 3:01:06 AM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:
> > > On Sat, 25 Dec 2021 01:12:53 -0800 (PST)
> > > Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > > > Where'd you go?
> > > >
> > > > Did you decide 'pataphors' were too 'pat'?
> > > More like I was starting to suspect you're one of those people
> > > who'd just delete most of the world population so your kind of sex
> > > becomes the new normal.
> >
> > Did you know that the guys in Nomeansno are my cousins? So proud.
> > ("Kill Everyone Now" was not seriously meant, SAC.)
> A long time a go I went to a nude beach with a girl friend. As I was
> taking off my clothes, she objected "I don't want to see that". And I
> was like "look this is a nude beach, everyone is naked". After all
> this time maybe I understand her better now, but unfortunately she
> emigrated to Costa Rica. Maybe I should go there too.

Was this before or after you inflicted horrible pain on someone
through non-consensual rape, or neither -- the question does not
obtain? Tiresome "leisure suit" stuff from the 1970s, and obviously
viciously misogynistic even to them.

("What's wrong with the thong?" What you think you do with one.)

> > > And anyway, if you tell an American their equations are wrong,
> > > they're just like "sucks to be you".
> >
> > Well, if you're an HIV-positive sex criminal reliving their academic
> > failure through an Internet con that no longer works... never mind.
> How so? The only way not to lose is not to play. Works for sex too,
> you should try it sometimes.
> > > I mean, it's beyond rube.
> >
> > They used to think that neologism was a sign of mental illness.
> > I'm glad we've left those days behind.

> You seem to confabulate diseases on people that aren't there, is that
> still in the DSM.

Love that word -- it seems a bit more apt than "pataphor".
Monomania? Baron von Munchhausen disease? "Walking pneumonia", i.e. revolutionary chiliasm?
Sure. "Rube"? It's a noun, not an adjective.

[pataphor]

On Mon, 27 Dec 2021 22:47:00 -0800 (PST)
Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Was this before or after you inflicted horrible pain on someone
> through non-consensual rape, or neither -- the question does not
> obtain? Tiresome "leisure suit" stuff from the 1970s, and obviously
> viciously misogynistic even to them.
>
> ("What's wrong with the thong?" What you think you do with one.)

What this Epstein guy did was bad, but you know what comes close to
that as a second contender? Falsely accusing someone of rape. And ain't
your first name Jeffrey. From now on I will refer to you as ms Epstein
until you halt your balefire.

Hail Stallman.

> Love that word -- it seems a bit more apt than "pataphor".
> Monomania? Baron von Munchhausen disease? "Walking pneumonia", i.e.
> revolutionary chiliasm? Sure. "Rube"? It's a noun, not an adjective.

When I use a word... it means just what I choose it to mean.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

On Tuesday, December 28, 2021 at 6:21:22 AM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:
> On Mon, 27 Dec 2021 22:47:00 -0800 (PST)
> Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Was this before or after you inflicted horrible pain on someone
> > through non-consensual rape, or neither -- the question does not
> > obtain? Tiresome "leisure suit" stuff from the 1970s, and obviously
> > viciously misogynistic even to them.
> >
> > ("What's wrong with the thong?" What you think you do with one.)
> What this Epstein guy did was bad, but you know what comes close to
> that as a second contender? Falsely accusing someone of rape. And ain't
> your first name Jeffrey. From now on I will refer to you as ms Epstein
> until you halt your balefire.

Did you take legal tips from Ted Bundy, dude? I sure didn't "falsely accuse"
you of rape. I, rather questionably, indicated that your supposed "wordplay"
shows tendencies towards that or other types of sex crime. That's no joke to
me, fuckboy; I'm pretty happy Epstein bit it. (No, one name is not quite the other.)

> Hail Stallman.

Do you want to learn a non-recursive heuristic?
"Dumb's not intelligent".

> > Love that word -- it seems a bit more apt than "pataphor".
> > Monomania? Baron von Munchhausen disease? "Walking pneumonia", i.e.
> > revolutionary chiliasm? Sure. "Rube"? It's a noun, not an adjective.

> When I use a word... it means just what I choose it to mean.

Tasteless, foolish, dangerous: the hallmarks of a "cultural philistine" fer sure.
Then *everything* means just what you want it to mean, and everyone
has to do just what you want, and when they don't...

[pataphor]

On Tue, 28 Dec 2021 14:20:02 -0800 (PST)

Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Tuesday, December 28, 2021 at 6:21:22 AM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:
> > On Mon, 27 Dec 2021 22:47:00 -0800 (PST)
> > Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > > Was this before or after you inflicted horrible pain on someone
> > > through non-consensual rape, or neither -- the question does not
> > > obtain? Tiresome "leisure suit" stuff from the 1970s, and
> > > obviously viciously misogynistic even to them.
> > >
> > > ("What's wrong with the thong?" What you think you do with one.)
> > What this Epstein guy did was bad, but you know what comes close to
> > that as a second contender? Falsely accusing someone of rape. And
> > ain't your first name Jeffrey. From now on I will refer to you as
> > ms Epstein until you halt your balefire.
>
> Did you take legal tips from Ted Bundy, dude? I sure didn't "falsely
> accuse" you of rape. I, rather questionably, indicated that your
> supposed "wordplay" shows tendencies towards that or other types of
> sex crime. That's no joke to me, fuckboy; I'm pretty happy Epstein
> bit it. (No, one name is not quite the other.)

Yeah, that was awkward and uncalled for. But in my defense, I didn't
realize you were actually on the spectrum, until just today (high
functioning autistic?) and have no idea wtf is going on and can only
heap more and more dirt on people to express your dissatisfaction with
the situation, while I was interpreting it as if it meant anything. And
you weren't actually driving with your warning lights on, and this is
not advertised as a self help area.

But ultimately, I owe you an apology, autistic people exist and we
have to be ready to deal with them, even if they are swept ashore on
desert islands were only philosophers visit from time to time.

And to think I was doing the world a service by educating you about
truth and semantics, when all I achieved was to destabilize you more
and more. I feel like I could sink into the ground right now.

> > Hail Stallman.
>
> Do you want to learn a non-recursive heuristic?
> "Dumb's not intelligent".

Right, sorry again. I usually try to avoid autistic people since
they're kind of trapdoors for me, and backed by organizations were
people work who earn enough to not have them in their own environment so
that they can loudly proclaim how much they deserve to have a normal
life. But this one is one where the effects of their stubborn refusal
to go along with the capitalist exploitation system paid off enough to
outweigh the trade-offs.

Not that I don't think everyone should have the opportunity to live a
normal life, whatever their neurological make up, mind you.

> > > Love that word -- it seems a bit more apt than "pataphor".
> > > Monomania? Baron von Munchhausen disease? "Walking pneumonia",
> > > i.e. revolutionary chiliasm? Sure. "Rube"? It's a noun, not an
> > > adjective.
>
> > When I use a word... it means just what I choose it to mean.
>
> Tasteless, foolish, dangerous: the hallmarks of a "cultural
> philistine" fer sure. Then *everything* means just what you want it
> to mean, and everyone has to do just what you want, and when they
> don't...

OK, I get it, you just don't have a clue why I would say something like
that and must fall back to general dissatisfaction with everything.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

Uh huh, so someone else's mental illness -- the opposite kind to the
one they were supposed to have -- is supposed to make your own
misdeeds go away? That seems about "par for the course" and
subpar for public US life. Like I said, I get the cute "threatening" language,
dovetails with the suspicion of you being one of those high-class
"genial" rapists.

> But ultimately, I owe you an apology, autistic people exist and we
> have to be ready to deal with them, even if they are swept ashore on
> desert islands were only philosophers visit from time to time.
>
> And to think I was doing the world a service by educating you about
> truth and semantics, when all I achieved was to destabilize you more
> and more. I feel like I could sink into the ground right now.

Your "Contributions to the Theory of Models" are perhaps not as legendary
as you think. (Contributions to the annals of infamy? Now we might be talking!)

> > > Hail Stallman.
> >
> > Do you want to learn a non-recursive heuristic?
> > "Dumb's not intelligent".

> Right, sorry again. I usually try to avoid autistic people since
> they're kind of trapdoors for me, and backed by organizations were
> people work who earn enough to not have them in their own environment so
> that they can loudly proclaim how much they deserve to have a normal
> life. But this one is one where the effects of their stubborn refusal
> to go along with the capitalist exploitation system paid off enough to
> outweigh the trade-offs.

Did you buy this from a "life coach"?

> Not that I don't think everyone should have the opportunity to live a
> normal life, whatever their neurological make up, mind you.
> > > > Love that word -- it seems a bit more apt than "pataphor".
> > > > Monomania? Baron von Munchhausen disease? "Walking pneumonia",
> > > > i.e. revolutionary chiliasm? Sure. "Rube"? It's a noun, not an
> > > > adjective.
> >
> > > When I use a word... it means just what I choose it to mean.
> >
> > Tasteless, foolish, dangerous: the hallmarks of a "cultural
> > philistine" fer sure. Then *everything* means just what you want it
> > to mean, and everyone has to do just what you want, and when they
> > don't...

> OK, I get it, you just don't have a clue why I would say something like
> that and must fall back to general dissatisfaction with everything.

Is it because you're some dumbfuck psychopath who thinks they
learned a "technique" involving Charles Dodgson's mockery of such
people? (Again, about not "taking cues", not a model for behavior
with young women but that's what that is in Lewis Carroll - mockery.)

[Jeffrey Rubard]

(2021 Update: That's a series of papers by Alfred Tarski in the 1950s taking his
"theory of truth" in the direction of modern model theory. They were published
in the Journal of Symbolic Logic and widely read at the time.)

Well, is it? (Also, stay away from young girls.)

[pataphor]

On Sat, 1 Jan 2022 23:37:20 -0800 (PST)
Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:
[...]

> > Your "Contributions to the Theory of Models" are perhaps not as
> > legendary as you think. (Contributions to the annals of infamy? Now
> > we might be talking!)
>
> (2021 Update: That's a series of papers by Alfred Tarski in the 1950s
> taking his "theory of truth" in the direction of modern model theory.
> They were published in the Journal of Symbolic Logic and widely read
> at the time.)

And by now he's dead for long enough that you can unobtrusively start
to reclaim him for your list of Jewish geniuses? Is that what you're
going to use your language cues for? Seems like guilty expertise to me,
and maybe it'll bite your Jewish conspiracy in the ass, if you having
used it prematurely for selfish purposes comes out, and those turned
out to be duds, or were inactivated before impact.

But the whole idea of gerrymandering all science to fit some list of
people you choose is wrong from the start, and probably one of the main
reasons why we're now 'freighted' with a replication crisis. A good
replication, or even an independent rediscovery, as I did, however
imperfect, with Tarski's ideas, can be as, or even more important as
being the first in a tightly controlled jet set of academic speakers.

We should focus more on encouraging people, help them to correct
possible defects, or be impressed with how they group scientific
insights from very distant disciplines together.

I only proved that Goedels insight is by now rather trivial, many
programmers would have stumbled upon it by accident, because we are used
to having information technology around for long enough to have grown
up with it, not that it wasn't still an impressive accomplishment *at
the time*. And accordingly we should listen more to practitioners of
the various disciplines now, and less to academic exclusionists with
their outdated pioneer mindsets.

I'll admit that it may be some time before we'll treat giants like
Einstein with the same kind of nostalgic romanticism, but in general,
that's where we're going, or should be going.

As to Tarski's theory of truth, or even modern model theory, it doesn't
even matter, because these are "end game" theories, while the real truth
is determined in the middle game, as in chess, where we start to
determine what is what, to begin with. And I'm not even taking about
the opening yet.

Basically Tarski is counting the chickens before they're hatched,
indubitably very useful once they're there, but the real truth is in
the hatching.

> > Is it because you're some dumbfuck psychopath who thinks they
> > learned a "technique" involving Charles Dodgson's mockery of such
> > people? (Again, about not "taking cues", not a model for behavior
> > with young women but that's what that is in Lewis Carroll -
> > mockery.)
>
> Well, is it? (Also, stay away from young girls.)

You seem to be astonishingly ungrateful or uninterested in that
universe of meaning I just uncovered, like what world could there be
beyond rube? Chinese mythological princesses living in a drop of water
for 60000 years, not only unaware of the laws of physics, but actively
repressing them if they try to impose? Alice has nothing on them.

[pataphor]

On Sun, 2 Jan 2022 18:27:02 +0100
pataphor <pata...@gmail.com> wrote:

[...]

> I only proved that Goedels insight is by now rather trivial, many
> programmers would have stumbled upon it by accident

Eh, of course I proved no such thing, except if one programs
recursive functions, his proof is much easier to follow.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

On Sunday, January 2, 2022 at 9:27:05 AM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:
> On Sat, 1 Jan 2022 23:37:20 -0800 (PST)
> Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:
> [...]
> > > Your "Contributions to the Theory of Models" are perhaps not as
> > > legendary as you think. (Contributions to the annals of infamy? Now
> > > we might be talking!)
> >
> > (2021 Update: That's a series of papers by Alfred Tarski in the 1950s
> > taking his "theory of truth" in the direction of modern model theory.
> > They were published in the Journal of Symbolic Logic and widely read
> > at the time.)
> And by now he's dead for long enough that you can unobtrusively start
> to reclaim him for your list of Jewish geniuses? Is that what you're
> going to use your language cues for? Seems like guilty expertise to me,
> and maybe it'll bite your Jewish conspiracy in the ass, if you having
> used it prematurely for selfish purposes comes out, and those turned
> out to be duds, or were inactivated before impact.

Oh god, an anti-Semite after even Nietzsche's heart! My "Jewish Sports
Heroes" book includes lots of, well, Jewish sports heroes and is somehow
ill-perused; you are really starting to disgust this Gentile a whole bunch,
though.

"At long last have you lost any proficiency with interaction in the English
language, fake senator? Is it the case that at long last you think this is
*any* kind of smart?"

(All Nazism aside, the question of "Al Tajtlebaum" and his relationship
to Judaism is an interesting one complicated by his immigration to
the US. I believe it is the case that he changed the name to "Tarski"
in Poland, of course, but his conversion to Roman Catholicism -- no,
that was von Neumann -- waited for becoming an American citizen.
"It would be a weird choice for a logician" is what we used to have
enough cultural literacy to say, but this turkey sure doesn't make
the cut.)

> But the whole idea of gerrymandering all science to fit some list of
> people you choose is wrong from the start, and probably one of the main
> reasons why we're now 'freighted' with a replication crisis. A good
> replication, or even an independent rediscovery, as I did, however
> imperfect, with Tarski's ideas, can be as, or even more important as
> being the first in a tightly controlled jet set of academic speakers.

Um, dude. "Gerrymandering" is somehow not as useful a concept
outside of political districting as one would wish it was, and, well,
I guess you now can't ask E.O. Wilson about your "concern" but
I wish you wouldn't ask me. What did you discover an independent
proof of? Tarski's Theorem that truth is not an "arithmetical" concept?
Can you explain it to me, then?

> We should focus more on encouraging people, help them to correct
> possible defects, or be impressed with how they group scientific
> insights from very distant disciplines together.

You mean like Hegel? I guess the *Encyclopedia* was actually kind
of good about that for its time!

> I only proved that Goedels insight is by now rather trivial, many
> programmers would have stumbled upon it by accident, because we are used
> to having information technology around for long enough to have grown
> up with it, not that it wasn't still an impressive accomplishment *at
> the time*. And accordingly we should listen more to practitioners of
> the various disciplines now, and less to academic exclusionists with
> their outdated pioneer mindsets.

On the other hand, you are ham-handedly and doggedly using "Mock modesty"
or "humblebragging" to indicate you have had a Very Important Thought that
trumps everything else, and will fill in its nature later. Maybe you could take a
tip from Jeffrey Rubard, Non-Esq. that's actually not a very "pragmatic" way
to go about things.

> I'll admit that it may be some time before we'll treat giants like
> Einstein with the same kind of nostalgic romanticism, but in general,
> that's where we're going, or should be going.

Yeah, whatever.

> As to Tarski's theory of truth, or even modern model theory, it doesn't
> even matter, because these are "end game" theories, while the real truth
> is determined in the middle game, as in chess, where we start to
> determine what is what, to begin with. And I'm not even taking about
> the opening yet.

"Belittling" as though all the world were in need of a Penn Jillette routine
on some theory we hardly understand? I'm agin it, basically.

> Basically Tarski is counting the chickens before they're hatched,
> indubitably very useful once they're there, but the real truth is in
> the hatching.

Were you raised on a diet of "hand-waving claims on people's time"?
I suppose in a way you were, perhaps.

> > > Is it because you're some dumbfuck psychopath who thinks they
> > > learned a "technique" involving Charles Dodgson's mockery of such
> > > people? (Again, about not "taking cues", not a model for behavior
> > > with young women but that's what that is in Lewis Carroll -
> > > mockery.)
> >
> > Well, is it? (Also, stay away from young girls.)

> You seem to be astonishingly ungrateful or uninterested in that
> universe of meaning I just uncovered, like what world could there be
> beyond rube? Chinese mythological princesses living in a drop of water
> for 60000 years, not only unaware of the laws of physics, but actively
> repressing them if they try to impose? Alice has nothing on them.

Yeah, rapists talk like that sometimes: "cutesy" folderol to distract from
more practical and extremely craven agendas. Stay away from young
women, do this.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

And your guide in thinking about this was... Kleene? Tell me why, ese.

[pataphor]

On Sun, 2 Jan 2022 20:01:12 -0800 (PST)

Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:

[...]

> On the other hand, you are ham-handedly and doggedly using "Mock
> modesty" or "humblebragging" to indicate you have had a Very
> Important Thought that trumps everything else, and will fill in its
> nature later. Maybe you could take a tip from Jeffrey Rubard,
> Non-Esq. that's actually not a very "pragmatic" way to go about

Why ask them? They're all clones, always ad hominem, and the most
cooperation you'd get out of them is some narcissistic admission
that there is some detail which you didn't mention that one might be
right about.

Last one I saw was some catawumpus

[pataphor]

It doesn't work like that in programming, it's more like coming across
the thing in various forms, and at some point it 'clicks'. Would
probably be the natural state for math too, if not everyone and their
co assistant would have staked their claim to fame.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

Ad homimen like these arguments you've put down? Well, gracious, oh
my, etc. Whose "narcissicism" is this supposed to be in the second case?

>
> Last one I saw was some catawumpus

I don't know what this word means. Would you have to be in the Mafia to know?

[Jeffrey Rubard]

That doesn't sound like recursion; recursion isn't a thing you study
"empirically". (It's almost like a textbook case of that.) Kleene was
really the Tarski of recursion, you knew this, right?

[pataphor]

On Mon, 3 Jan 2022 09:06:47 -0800 (PST)
Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Monday, January 3, 2022 at 8:10:38 AM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:

[...]

> > It doesn't work like that in programming, it's more like coming
> > across the thing in various forms, and at some point it 'clicks'.
> > Would probably be the natural state for math too, if not everyone
> > and their co assistant would have staked their claim to fame.
>
> That doesn't sound like recursion; recursion isn't a thing you study
> "empirically". (It's almost like a textbook case of that.) Kleene was
> really the Tarski of recursion, you knew this, right?

You mustn't have programmed a lot, with your head in the books all the
time, and your feet kicking the non-woke.

[pataphor]

On Mon, 3 Jan 2022 09:05:07 -0800 (PST)
Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Monday, January 3, 2022 at 3:22:48 AM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:

[...]

> > Last one I saw was some catawumpus
>
> I don't know what this word means. Would you have to be in the Mafia
> to know?

can't you use a search engine? Anyway someone that used to post here a
lot, or maybe under another nick. He's practically your twin, except
non-woke, but less gentle maybe, if possible.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

I'm pretty sure John Backus wouldn't "back" you: programming isn't a metaphor,
and you can brag about actually coding to someone else.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

Uh, no, I think it's some lingo you'd have to be in the Mafia to know.
"Means whatever I want it to mean" kind of stuff. (Wouldn't make
a good handle.)

[pataphor]

On Mon, 3 Jan 2022 23:49:35 -0800 (PST)

For me, Backus, Kleene and Tarski are like these weird statues from old
and forgotten wars, that only appeared very late in the game, if at all
relevant. Yes, sure, one can claim that without Columbus, theoretically
the west would still be inhabited by roving Indians with razor sharp
obsidian swords and we'd have to have had our technology
development outsourced to some other continent, maybe Africa.

But what are these people now to me? It may be that when I started
programming it wasn't yet captured by the educational system and I
could learn things on my own. If I had to credit anyone with helping
me advance in the early stages, it would Frank Ostrowski, the creator
of GFA basic.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

Damn, these really *are* word salads, and they're supposed to be delicious, aren't they?
Hardly the case that the 'originators' of a field (um, Backus invented, um, Fortran) appear
'late in the game'. More racist garbage about indigenous people, check, Africans, check,
light allusion to not-very-good movie about Black Panthers, and we've totally avoided
the topics of 1) actual computer programming intellectually backed by 2) actual
recursion theory to which 3) the actual theories of Alfred Tarski do not apply on account
of Church's undecidability theorem. And all this in alt.postmodern.

> But what are these people now to me? It may be that when I started
> programming it wasn't yet captured by the educational system and I
> could learn things on my own. If I had to credit anyone with helping
> me advance in the early stages, it would Frank Ostrowski, the creator
> of GFA basic.

Livin' the Republican dream, aren't you? But I guess it would be *just* you, a la.
Something that is supposed to be a Russian word we heard about from someone
("Izvestia" == ?), and we're just about ready to accuse someone of having the cognitive
errors our barely semantically interpretable words would manifest...

[Jeffrey Rubard]

"You can jump, you can holler
Never lose what I found"

[pataphor]

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29794170

---

"You're a little late and I'm already torn"

[Jeffrey Rubard]

Clap clap clap.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

That's kind of the "Never Gonna Give You Up" of CS/formal logic, isn't it?

[pataphor]

On Sun, 9 Jan 2022 20:23:29 -0800 (PST)
Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:

> > > "You're a little late and I'm already torn"
> > Clap clap clap.
>
> That's kind of the "Never Gonna Give You Up" of CS/formal logic,
> isn't it?

If you're going on until the end, to prove one can arrive at situations
where one can't tell whether one is being rick-rolled or not, you'll
notice it takes too much energy, tiring one out before one even
manages to look smart.

---

"this space intentionally left blank"

[Jeffrey Rubard]

Alternate hypothesis: Astley was trying to "out" humpy sex violators,
who would think the song about as funny as "Smooth Criminal".
(Or maybe I'm wrong. Wrong happens.)

[pataphor]

On Mon, 10 Jan 2022 18:26:40 -0800 (PST)
Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Alternate hypothesis: Astley was trying to "out" humpy sex violators,
> who would think the song about as funny as "Smooth Criminal".

But why would men turn into humpties, if their emotional needs for
intimacy weren't always seen through the lens of primitive sexual
desires?

Sometimes I wonder about a world where women would be raised from birth
to develop the proper emotional intelligence to help men reach their
full potential, but since I left that world altogether and I've noticed
that it's a huge energy saver, why would men go back to such a bad
deal even in an ideal world, such as we don't have yet.

> (Or maybe I'm wrong. Wrong happens.)

Since you seem to be in the right mood, why not goto the beginning of
this subthread where I tried to explain that acquiring the concept of
recursion would be more of a gradual affair, and where the supposed
originators of the ideas didn't appear on the scene (yes, even if they
were already 'there' in a technical sense), because no one had access
to much documentation or existing example software, and still thought
in terms of basic goto's, even if languages like GFA basic already
provided the means to separately define functions, and had a nifty
code editor where one could also 'fold' these parts of the code so as to
make everything much more comprehensible.

It still was a time where computing was only recently arising out of
the realm of chaos.

And about being wrong in general, it gets problematical once the ego is
involved, because it assumes the world dies when it dies, and therefore
anything goes, to prevent that from happening.

Basically the kind of headspace Rick is in, after discovering he'd
produced a Morty.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

On Tuesday, January 11, 2022 at 4:21:45 AM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:
> On Mon, 10 Jan 2022 18:26:40 -0800 (PST)
> Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Alternate hypothesis: Astley was trying to "out" humpy sex violators,
> > who would think the song about as funny as "Smooth Criminal".

> But why would men turn into humpties, if their emotional needs for
> intimacy weren't always seen through the lens of primitive sexual
> desires?

Maybe don't profane the (now) holy name of Shock G, now gone from a world containing idiots like you. (You weren't really supposed to "grab them in the biscuits" and so much more.)

> Sometimes I wonder about a world where women would be raised from birth
> to develop the proper emotional intelligence to help men reach their
> full potential, but since I left that world altogether and I've noticed
> that it's a huge energy saver, why would men go back to such a bad
> deal even in an ideal world, such as we don't have yet.

Wow, medical-grade folderol. Such wow. I don't even have the energy to play the usual "feminist sax" about it. (And it's me we're talking about here; you must be a real turkey.)

> > (Or maybe I'm wrong. Wrong happens.)

> Since you seem to be in the right mood, why not goto the beginning of
> this subthread where I tried to explain that acquiring the concept of
> recursion would be more of a gradual affair, and where the supposed
> originators of the ideas didn't appear on the scene (yes, even if they
> were already 'there' in a technical sense), because no one had access
> to much documentation or existing example software, and still thought
> in terms of basic goto's, even if languages like GFA basic already
> provided the means to separately define functions, and had a nifty
> code editor where one could also 'fold' these parts of the code so as to
> make everything much more comprehensible.

What do you think of Gerhard Gentzen?

> It still was a time where computing was only recently arising out of
> the realm of chaos.

What do you think of not impertinently showing people something like "fractals"?

> And about being wrong in general, it gets problematical once the ego is
> involved, because it assumes the world dies when it dies, and therefore
> anything goes, to prevent that from happening.

*Not* medical-grade folderol?

> Basically the kind of headspace Rick is in, after discovering he'd
> produced a Morty.

Um, can you stay away from children in the future?

[Jeffrey Rubard]

To be coarse, "Mr. Wizard type stuff" should be taken to raise flags, not hackles.
"Oooh." Um, maybe "oooh" yourself.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

Still out there? (Not *literally around the corner*, though?)

[pataphor]

On Wed, 19 Jan 2022 19:58:36 -0800 (PST)
Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:

[...]

> > > Wow, medical-grade folderol. Such wow. I don't even have the
> > > energy to play the usual "feminist sax" about it. (And it's me
> > > we're talking about here; you must be a real turkey.)

Who are you anyway?

a) a Finnish transgender
b) a gay troll
c) some [diversion in order to prevent actually having to respond]
d) a bot that uses aggressive statements to hide the fact it doesn't
actually have any grasp of the context
e) someone who doesn't realize feminist posing is actually very passe

And no, it's not like the longest answer is usually the best, as in
multiple choice questions

> > > What do you think of Gerhard Gentzen?

I don't know, is he a cousin of Rudy Rucker.

> Still out there? (Not *literally around the corner*, though?)

I'm in the other thread, you don't mean anything to me now anymore.
I've wiped the tape. Planted false memories over it even.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

On Thursday, January 20, 2022 at 3:16:15 AM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:
> On Wed, 19 Jan 2022 19:58:36 -0800 (PST)
> Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> [...]
> > > > Wow, medical-grade folderol. Such wow. I don't even have the
> > > > energy to play the usual "feminist sax" about it. (And it's me
> > > > we're talking about here; you must be a real turkey.)
> Who are you anyway?
>
> a) a Finnish transgender
> b) a gay troll
> c) some [diversion in order to prevent actually having to respond]
> d) a bot that uses aggressive statements to hide the fact it doesn't
> actually have any grasp of the context
> e) someone who doesn't realize feminist posing is actually very passe

I'll never tire of feminist posing, like some people never tire of acting
"like a Jew, but not really". (My surname roughly says 'like a Jew, but
not really' so I consider it kind of 'done'.) They also don't tire of acting
like Finnish S&M cartoons, unlike lots of perfectly nice gay people
and some normal straight people besides.

> And no, it's not like the longest answer is usually the best, as in
> multiple choice questions

Wow, you tell it right to human discourse! (That's a sign of mental
illness. You can 'trust me' on this one.)

> > > > What do you think of Gerhard Gentzen?
> I don't know, is he a cousin of Rudy Rucker.

No, he wasn't that evil. He was a German logician.

> > Still out there? (Not *literally around the corner*, though?)
> I'm in the other thread, you don't mean anything to me now anymore.

You're going to stop rushing me with 'koffs'? Definitely more enthused,
but it's a relative thing!

> I've wiped the tape. Planted false memories over it even.

Did it get your doody on it, or something? Please, fool.

[pataphor]

On Thu, 20 Jan 2022 21:44:32 -0800 (PST)

Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Thursday, January 20, 2022 at 3:16:15 AM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:
> > On Wed, 19 Jan 2022 19:58:36 -0800 (PST)
> > Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > [...]
> > > > > Wow, medical-grade folderol. Such wow. I don't even have the
> > > > > energy to play the usual "feminist sax" about it. (And it's
> > > > > me we're talking about here; you must be a real turkey.)
> > Who are you anyway?
> >
> > a) a Finnish transgender
> > b) a gay troll
> > c) some [diversion in order to prevent actually having to respond]
> > d) a bot that uses aggressive statements to hide the fact it
> > doesn't actually have any grasp of the context
> > e) someone who doesn't realize feminist posing is actually very
> > passe
>
> I'll never tire of feminist posing, like some people never tire of
> acting "like a Jew, but not really". (My surname roughly says 'like a
> Jew, but not really' so I consider it kind of 'done'.) They also
> don't tire of acting like Finnish S&M cartoons, unlike lots of
> perfectly nice gay people and some normal straight people besides.

A semi-Jewish logician with S&M fantasies? This is starting to look
like these so-called rationalists, whose collective hallucinations
project the evil as coming from outside, instead of from within.

> > And no, it's not like the longest answer is usually the best, as in
> > multiple choice questions
>
> Wow, you tell it right to human discourse! (That's a sign of mental
> illness. You can 'trust me' on this one.)
>

Obviously no consequentialist.

> > > > > What do you think of Gerhard Gentzen?
> > I don't know, is he a cousin of Rudy Rucker.
>
> No, he wasn't that evil. He was a German logician.

I'm like James Bond here, going to die anyway. Why not gloat a little
and reveal your plot?

> > > Still out there? (Not *literally around the corner*, though?)
> > I'm in the other thread, you don't mean anything to me now anymore.
> >
>
> You're going to stop rushing me with 'koffs'? Definitely more
> enthused, but it's a relative thing!

Don't know what that is, some ancient latex file format, er even worse,
windows? Brr.

> > I've wiped the tape. Planted false memories over it even.
>
> Did it get your doody on it, or something? Please, fool.

I thought maybe you'd understand stuff better with role play, but it
seems you're limited to rape fantasies.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

You disgust the fuck out of me. Sounds like your ideal victim to you, huh?
(I look like Gentzen, baby, and it's a little real why.)

> > > And no, it's not like the longest answer is usually the best, as in
> > > multiple choice questions
> >
> > Wow, you tell it right to human discourse! (That's a sign of mental
> > illness. You can 'trust me' on this one.)
> >
> Obviously no consequentialist.

I'm at least not a *dangerous* schizoid creep, who thinks other humans
are essentially their "dingleberries" via mind self-rot techniques like this.
("Ideas have no consequences", some say, primarily because they're not
fucktards.)

> > > > > > What do you think of Gerhard Gentzen?
> > > I don't know, is he a cousin of Rudy Rucker.
> >
> > No, he wasn't that evil. He was a German logician.
> I'm like James Bond here, going to die anyway. Why not gloat a little
> and reveal your plot?

I'm like very tired of "canned cons" by this point. Why don't you stop
acting like this? I don't plot stories involving "ladykiller" gaslighting,
so it isn't for me.

> > > > Still out there? (Not *literally around the corner*, though?)
> > > I'm in the other thread, you don't mean anything to me now anymore.
> > >
> >
> > You're going to stop rushing me with 'koffs'? Definitely more
> > enthused, but it's a relative thing!

> Don't know what that is, some ancient latex file format, er even worse,
> windows? Brr.

"It was such a thing. It was the thing that was the thing."
"Edge" used to mean something intelligent; it was derived from the Gramscian concept of hegemony.
Allowing one's brain damage to think that "fairy-stories" and bad mimicry justify killing strangers, well,
that's on a lower order of being.

> > > I've wiped the tape. Planted false memories over it even.
> >
> > Did it get your doody on it, or something? Please, fool.

> I thought maybe you'd understand stuff better with role play, but it
> seems you're limited to rape fantasies.

I'm limited to them. Please don't you act them out, OK? Also see a neurologist.

[pataphor]

On Fri, 21 Jan 2022 14:05:29 -0800 (PST)

Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:

[...]

> > A semi-Jewish logician with S&M fantasies? This is starting to look
> > like these so-called rationalists, whose collective hallucinations
> > project the evil as coming from outside, instead of from within.
>
> You disgust the fuck out of me. Sounds like your ideal victim to you,
> huh? (I look like Gentzen, baby, and it's a little real why.)

Even if you were the ideal victim, you still would be safe from me
because it's just not my thing.

> > Obviously no consequentialist.
>
> I'm at least not a *dangerous* schizoid creep, who thinks other humans
> are essentially their "dingleberries" via mind self-rot techniques
> like this. ("Ideas have no consequences", some say, primarily because
> they're not fucktards.)

Maybe you misunderstood, I'm not a consequentialist either, leaning
more towards "doing good" than towards "punishing the bad". It's
probably related to virtue ethics, or, if one would draw logicians into
it, training based on rewards has better big O behavior than punishing
mistakes.

I realize there are situations where fighting evil might be more apt,
say, like why do we have immune systems fighting disease and stuff, and
also, especially in times where I felt like I was treated badly, I
can't deny having these kinds of feelings arising.

But, assuming, there's still a lot more advancement possible than
established bad stuff, a philosophy that is more goal oriented, towards
increasing good things, seems to me to have a better learning curve and
would thus be preferable to consequentialism. Though I can't tell how
much of consequentialism itself is bad and how much it's just because
it's the main conceit of the rationalists.

> > > > > > > What do you think of Gerhard Gentzen?
> > > > I don't know, is he a cousin of Rudy Rucker.
> > >
> > > No, he wasn't that evil. He was a German logician.
> > I'm like James Bond here, going to die anyway. Why not gloat a
> > little and reveal your plot?
>
> I'm like very tired of "canned cons" by this point. Why don't you stop
> acting like this? I don't plot stories involving "ladykiller"
> gaslighting, so it isn't for me.

You don't get to control my semantics here. As Spock once said "the
needs of the many outweigh the need of the few", and, in my opinion
you're occupying a pretty niche market here, and even if for those few
the issue is relatively more salient, they are still outweighed by the
dumb masses.

> > > > > Still out there? (Not *literally around the corner*, though?)
> > > > >
> > > > I'm in the other thread, you don't mean anything to me now
> > > > anymore.
> > >
> > > You're going to stop rushing me with 'koffs'? Definitely more
> > > enthused, but it's a relative thing!
>
> > Don't know what that is, some ancient latex file format, er even
> > worse, windows? Brr.
>
> "It was such a thing. It was the thing that was the thing."
> "Edge" used to mean something intelligent; it was derived from the
> Gramscian concept of hegemony. Allowing one's brain damage to think
> that "fairy-stories" and bad mimicry justify killing strangers, well,
> that's on a lower order of being.

Are you even a vegetarian? Stop with the false hypocrisy.

> > I thought maybe you'd understand stuff better with role play, but
> > it seems you're limited to rape fantasies.
>
> I'm limited to them. Please don't you act them out, OK? Also see a
> neurologist.

Understood. If it took me too long to figure it out please understand I
can't adapt my general semantics to special case your exotic
market interests.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

On Saturday, January 22, 2022 at 4:28:32 AM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:
> On Fri, 21 Jan 2022 14:05:29 -0800 (PST)
> Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> [...]
> > > A semi-Jewish logician with S&M fantasies? This is starting to look
> > > like these so-called rationalists, whose collective hallucinations
> > > project the evil as coming from outside, instead of from within.
> >
> > You disgust the fuck out of me. Sounds like your ideal victim to you,
> > huh? (I look like Gentzen, baby, and it's a little real why.)
> Even if you were the ideal victim, you still would be safe from me
> because it's just not my thing.

(Hey guys, I think psychopaths think the charm takes longer to wear off
than in in fact does.)

> > > Obviously no consequentialist.
> >
> > I'm at least not a *dangerous* schizoid creep, who thinks other humans
> > are essentially their "dingleberries" via mind self-rot techniques
> > like this. ("Ideas have no consequences", some say, primarily because
> > they're not fucktards.)

> Maybe you misunderstood, I'm not a consequentialist either, leaning
> more towards "doing good" than towards "punishing the bad". It's
> probably related to virtue ethics, or, if one would draw logicians into
> it, training based on rewards has better big O behavior than punishing
> mistakes.

Utilitarian ethics and asymptotic algorithmic complexity
aren't related except in "extremely disordered discourse", the kind it
isn't worth pouring on people (like you are doing right now),

> I realize there are situations where fighting evil might be more apt,
> say, like why do we have immune systems fighting disease and stuff, and
> also, especially in times where I felt like I was treated badly, I
> can't deny having these kinds of feelings arising.

Hey bud-dee, this is incredibly tiresome (and I say "And it's me talking"
to register, for example, that I am one of the most tiresome people many
have ever met).

> But, assuming, there's still a lot more advancement possible than
> established bad stuff, a philosophy that is more goal oriented, towards
> increasing good things, seems to me to have a better learning curve and
> would thus be preferable to consequentialism. Though I can't tell how
> much of consequentialism itself is bad and how much it's just because
> it's the main conceit of the rationalists.

I think I once had to tell you on usenet "The Rationalists" were canonical
examples of non-consequentialists, and you were about to burst a vein
or something. Could we not talk?

> > > > > > > > What do you think of Gerhard Gentzen?
> > > > > I don't know, is he a cousin of Rudy Rucker.
> > > >
> > > > No, he wasn't that evil. He was a German logician.
> > > I'm like James Bond here, going to die anyway. Why not gloat a
> > > little and reveal your plot?
> >
> > I'm like very tired of "canned cons" by this point. Why don't you stop
> > acting like this? I don't plot stories involving "ladykiller"
> > gaslighting, so it isn't for me.

> You don't get to control my semantics here. As Spock once said "the
> needs of the many outweigh the need of the few", and, in my opinion
> you're occupying a pretty niche market here, and even if for those few
> the issue is relatively more salient, they are still outweighed by the
> dumb masses.

Again, about the "ladykiller" gaslighting, how it is both maddeningly stupid
and fairly threatening, etc.

> > > > > > Still out there? (Not *literally around the corner*, though?)
> > > > > >
> > > > > I'm in the other thread, you don't mean anything to me now
> > > > > anymore.
> > > >
> > > > You're going to stop rushing me with 'koffs'? Definitely more
> > > > enthused, but it's a relative thing!
> >
> > > Don't know what that is, some ancient latex file format, er even
> > > worse, windows? Brr.
> >
> > "It was such a thing. It was the thing that was the thing."
> > "Edge" used to mean something intelligent; it was derived from the
> > Gramscian concept of hegemony. Allowing one's brain damage to think
> > that "fairy-stories" and bad mimicry justify killing strangers, well,
> > that's on a lower order of being.

> Are you even a vegetarian? Stop with the false hypocrisy.

I never tire of not being you.

> > > I thought maybe you'd understand stuff better with role play, but
> > > it seems you're limited to rape fantasies.
> >
> > I'm limited to them. Please don't you act them out, OK? Also see a
> > neurologist.

> Understood. If it took me too long to figure it out please understand I
> can't adapt my general semantics to special case your exotic
> market interests.

Mostly we, in the US these days at least, would prefer you not to talk this
kind of trash "loping" towards people, mhm?

[pataphor]

On Sat, 22 Jan 2022 05:58:46 -0800 (PST)

Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:
[...]

> > Maybe you misunderstood, I'm not a consequentialist either, leaning
> > more towards "doing good" than towards "punishing the bad". It's
> > probably related to virtue ethics, or, if one would draw logicians
> > into it, training based on rewards has better big O behavior than
> > punishing mistakes.
>
> Utilitarian ethics and asymptotic algorithmic complexity
> aren't related except in "extremely disordered discourse", the kind it
> isn't worth pouring on people (like you are doing right now),

you wish

> > I realize there are situations where fighting evil might be more
> > apt, say, like why do we have immune systems fighting disease and
> > stuff, and also, especially in times where I felt like I was
> > treated badly, I can't deny having these kinds of feelings arising.
> >
>
> Hey bud-dee, this is incredibly tiresome (and I say "And it's me
> talking" to register, for example, that I am one of the most tiresome
> people many have ever met).

Don't sell yourself short

> > But, assuming, there's still a lot more advancement possible than
> > established bad stuff, a philosophy that is more goal oriented,
> > towards increasing good things, seems to me to have a better
> > learning curve and would thus be preferable to consequentialism.
> > Though I can't tell how much of consequentialism itself is bad and
> > how much it's just because it's the main conceit of the
> > rationalists.
>
> I think I once had to tell you on usenet "The Rationalists" were
> canonical examples of non-consequentialists, and you were about to
> burst a vein or something. Could we not talk?

Seems we've met before then, but I can't remember. Maybe I should
reload some old usenet history.

> > > > > > > > > What do you think of Gerhard Gentzen?
> > > > > > I don't know, is he a cousin of Rudy Rucker.
> > > > >
> > > > > No, he wasn't that evil. He was a German logician.
> > > > I'm like James Bond here, going to die anyway. Why not gloat a
> > > > little and reveal your plot?
> > >
> > > I'm like very tired of "canned cons" by this point. Why don't you
> > > stop acting like this? I don't plot stories involving
> > > "ladykiller" gaslighting, so it isn't for me.
>
> > You don't get to control my semantics here. As Spock once said "the
> > needs of the many outweigh the need of the few", and, in my opinion
> > you're occupying a pretty niche market here, and even if for those
> > few the issue is relatively more salient, they are still outweighed
> > by the dumb masses.
>
> Again, about the "ladykiller" gaslighting, how it is both maddeningly
> stupid and fairly threatening, etc.

So if some part of a metaphor disgusts you, the whole thing is banned?
Are you some kind of nazi, or just unable to detach from the object
level.

> > > "It was such a thing. It was the thing that was the thing."
> > > "Edge" used to mean something intelligent; it was derived from
> > > the Gramscian concept of hegemony. Allowing one's brain damage to
> > > think that "fairy-stories" and bad mimicry justify killing
> > > strangers, well, that's on a lower order of being.
>
> > Are you even a vegetarian? Stop with the false hypocrisy.
>
> I never tire of not being you.

How many pie in sky people would you need to bring up, seems that list
is finite.

> > Understood. If it took me too long to figure it out please
> > understand I can't adapt my general semantics to special case your
> > exotic market interests.
>
> Mostly we, in the US these days at least, would prefer you not to
> talk this kind of trash "loping" towards people, mhm?

They can try, but it won't work, as a simple generalization of
Krugman's theory of interstellar trade would immediately show, unless
they'd stay in their own reference frame (e.g. their own spaceship)
forever or switch to spurdo spärde, in which case only the Valkyries
(or maybe that stargate mathematician) could save them, if they are so
inclined.

[pataphor]

On Sat, 22 Jan 2022 05:58:46 -0800 (PST)
Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:

> > Maybe you misunderstood, I'm not a consequentialist either, leaning
> > more towards "doing good" than towards "punishing the bad". It's
> > probably related to virtue ethics, or, if one would draw logicians
> > into it, training based on rewards has better big O behavior than
> > punishing mistakes.
>
> Utilitarian ethics and asymptotic algorithmic complexity
> aren't related except in "extremely disordered discourse", the kind it
> isn't worth pouring on people (like you are doing right now),

Huh, are you counting virtue ethics as utilitarianism? You're even
dumber than I thought. It's not only your people listening in, then
badmouthing me behind my back you know.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

On Sunday, January 23, 2022 at 2:11:47 AM UTC-8, pataphor wrote:
> On Sat, 22 Jan 2022 05:58:46 -0800 (PST)
> Jeffrey Rubard <jeffreyda...@gmail.com> wrote:
> [...]
> > > Maybe you misunderstood, I'm not a consequentialist either, leaning
> > > more towards "doing good" than towards "punishing the bad". It's
> > > probably related to virtue ethics, or, if one would draw logicians
> > > into it, training based on rewards has better big O behavior than
> > > punishing mistakes.
> >
> > Utilitarian ethics and asymptotic algorithmic complexity
> > aren't related except in "extremely disordered discourse", the kind it
> > isn't worth pouring on people (like you are doing right now),
> you wish
> > > I realize there are situations where fighting evil might be more
> > > apt, say, like why do we have immune systems fighting disease and
> > > stuff, and also, especially in times where I felt like I was
> > > treated badly, I can't deny having these kinds of feelings arising.
> > >

So... during our break... you didn't "act on your feelings" and attack anyone?
It's really important. Sometimes you can't even make it up to them, you
know.

> > Hey bud-dee, this is incredibly tiresome (and I say "And it's me
> > talking" to register, for example, that I am one of the most tiresome
> > people many have ever met).

> Don't sell yourself short

Sometimes it's all they remember of me!

> > > But, assuming, there's still a lot more advancement possible than
> > > established bad stuff, a philosophy that is more goal oriented,
> > > towards increasing good things, seems to me to have a better
> > > learning curve and would thus be preferable to consequentialism.
> > > Though I can't tell how much of consequentialism itself is bad and
> > > how much it's just because it's the main conceit of the
> > > rationalists.
> >
> > I think I once had to tell you on usenet "The Rationalists" were
> > canonical examples of non-consequentialists, and you were about to
> > burst a vein or something. Could we not talk?

> Seems we've met before then, but I can't remember. Maybe I should
> reload some old usenet history.

Yeah, you were running this scam before and put your PhD to shame.
(FYI: Academic philosophy became something like a "puppy mill", or food mill,
during a certain period. Ordinary schmucks who actually understood the
theories or at least genuine inquiry were In Serious Trouble. Probably over.)

> > > > > > > > > > What do you think of Gerhard Gentzen?
> > > > > > > I don't know, is he a cousin of Rudy Rucker.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > No, he wasn't that evil. He was a German logician.
> > > > > I'm like James Bond here, going to die anyway. Why not gloat a
> > > > > little and reveal your plot?
> > > >
> > > > I'm like very tired of "canned cons" by this point. Why don't you
> > > > stop acting like this? I don't plot stories involving
> > > > "ladykiller" gaslighting, so it isn't for me.
> >
> > > You don't get to control my semantics here. As Spock once said "the
> > > needs of the many outweigh the need of the few", and, in my opinion
> > > you're occupying a pretty niche market here, and even if for those
> > > few the issue is relatively more salient, they are still outweighed
> > > by the dumb masses.
> >
> > Again, about the "ladykiller" gaslighting, how it is both maddeningly
> > stupid and fairly threatening, etc.

> So if some part of a metaphor disgusts you, the whole thing is banned?
> Are you some kind of nazi, or just unable to detach from the object
> level.

Well, like, I'm a socialist and I'm a "national", so...
(FYI: Sometimes DOD-positive leftists would intentionally compare themselves
to Nazis or post-Nazis "erotetically", like, "So how is Burning Speer here
treating you"? These people lack irony on the topic.)

> > > > "It was such a thing. It was the thing that was the thing."
> > > > "Edge" used to mean something intelligent; it was derived from
> > > > the Gramscian concept of hegemony. Allowing one's brain damage to
> > > > think that "fairy-stories" and bad mimicry justify killing
> > > > strangers, well, that's on a lower order of being.
> >
> > > Are you even a vegetarian? Stop with the false hypocrisy.
> >
> > I never tire of not being you.

> How many pie in sky people would you need to bring up, seems that list
> is finite.

Lots of vegetarians kill, too. Don't be a racist ditz. On the other hand,
still so not tired not being you.

> > > Understood. If it took me too long to figure it out please
> > > understand I can't adapt my general semantics to special case your
> > > exotic market interests.
> >
> > Mostly we, in the US these days at least, would prefer you not to
> > talk this kind of trash "loping" towards people, mhm?

> They can try, but it won't work, as a simple generalization of
> Krugman's theory of interstellar trade would immediately show, unless
> they'd stay in their own reference frame (e.g. their own spaceship)
> forever or switch to spurdo spärde, in which case only the Valkyries
> (or maybe that stargate mathematician) could save them, if they are so
> inclined.

Did you read this con on a forum somewhere in 1997, or what?
How many times, man? (Don't really have much else to do, but probably
everybody "sees where it goes".)

[Jeffrey Rubard]

I'm counting ethics and CS as different things, and I'm sure *your*
psychiatrist agrees.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

April Non-Fools: So I guess you're about done, whatever-your-name-is?

[Jeffrey Rubard]

(You sure didn't rush, however much I "coughed". But about having the edge...)

[Jeffrey Rubard]

Do you think "Contributions to the Theory of Models" changed anything, though?

[Jeffrey Rubard]

Or changing his name from "Al Teitlebaum"?

[Jeffrey Rubard]

Maybe I misspelled it.

[Jeffrey Rubard]

"Alfred Taijtlebaum"?