my dad posted:

No.

The Butcher posted:

Basic rear end, fundamental math seems like it should be more universal than language though.

On or off. Yes or no. Thing or not thing. 1 or 0, or whatever you want to use to represent it.

1+1=2 will always come out the same way in this universe no matter how you say the words, no?

The Butcher posted:

Basic rear end, fundamental math seems like it should be more universal than language though.

On or off. Yes or no. Thing or not thing. 1 or 0, or whatever you want to use to represent it.

1+1=2 will always come out the same way in this universe no matter how you say the words, no?

LtStorm posted:

Well, ants are eusocial--they have a regimented society with divisions of labor. Which is one way they differ from your cells in that eusocial creatures divide labor between reproductive and non-reproductive roles whereas almost all of your cells reproduce in-place to make you grow and to replace themselves. Another way eusocial creatures differ from your cells is that they aren't really any less intelligent or less sentient as individuals than an equivalent member of a non-eusocial species (for example, a beetle), whereas your cells aren't sentient even though you are.

axeil posted:

I don't think OOCC is arguing ants have a conscious hive mind, but rather that even though ants are individual organisms when they're grouped together they behave in ways that accomplish large, organized tasks.

By that logic though, humanity has a hive mind which...I'm not actually as opposed to arguing as I thought I would be.

silence_kit posted:

This view sounds a lot like what the wikipedia page on the philosophy of mathematics calls 'mathematical realism' or 'mathematical platonism'. I suspect that these kinds of views are not very popular on this message board. Probably the average D&D poster is more inclined towards 'mathematical anti-realism' or 'mathematical formalism'.

I would say that a popular view on this forum is likely 'mathematical social constructivism', since on this forum everything and everyone can be reduced to being wholly a product of society. However, paradoxically, it is also often thought on this forum that researchers and scientists should act and do act above the whims of society and that they are kind of like the priests of the modern era.

Revelation 2-13 posted:

Humans are biological von Neumann probes. However, as evidenced by us being about to destroy ourselves via climate change, we're either way down the replication generations and our programming has become faulty, or we're supposed to self-destruct once we've 'phoned home' by creating radar, radio and so on.

LtStorm posted:

But what are you describing with your basic rear end, fundamental math? Abstract math may be a universal language, but reducing it down doesn't yield the rules of the universe.

Reducing math down yields axioms like "there is a natural number we call 0" and "every natural number, a, has a successor, Sa". You then use those axioms to generate theorems like the Pythagorean theorem, a² + b² = c² which is proven by a proof that uses basic logic with those axioms. You can also write a proof that 1+1=2, like here which I link instead of pasting because proofs for even simple things can be lengthy and look like the scribbling of madmen.

And that happens because to actually write a proof of anything in math you have to wade into the actual language of logic and math, instead of relying on the fact our brains are fantastic at intuitively understanding math such as us just knowing 1+1=2. And again, the language of logic isn't describing the rules of the universe, just the rules of math.

If you want to describe the rules of the universe you're going to take your math you generated with logic and start applying it to phenomenon and attributes of the universe you can see to try to describe them as accurately as you can based on the information about them you have. You're building models, and as you learn more you can refine those models. Because every part of science is a model that lets us both understand and make predictions about how a part of the universe works.

e: When you're building models to describe the rules of the universe is where you run into the fact we have no proof that our model is accurate everywhere in the universe.

quote:

1. Two sets are equal (are the same set) if they have the same elements.
2. Every non-empty set x contains a member y such that x and y are disjoint sets.
3. Subsets are commonly constructed using set builder notation. For example, the even integers can be constructed as the subset of the integers Z satisfying the congruence modulo predicate x ≡ 0
4. If x and y are sets, then there exists a set which contains x and y as elements.
5. The union over the elements of a set exists. For example, the union over the elements of the set { 1 , 2 } , { 2 , 3 } is { 1 , 2 , 3 }
6. The axiom schema of replacement asserts that the image of a set under any definable function will also fall inside a set.
7. There exists a set X having infinitely many members.
8. By definition a set z is a subset of a set x if and only if every element of z is also an element of x
9. For any set X, there is a binary relation R which well-orders X. This means R is a linear order on X such that every nonempty subset of X has a member which is minimal under R.

quote:

1. No consistent system of axioms whose theorems can be listed by an effective procedure (i.e., an algorithm) is capable of proving all truths about the arithmetic of the natural numbers. For any such consistent formal system, there will always be statements about the natural numbers that are true, but that are unprovable within the system.

2. A system cannot determine its own consistency

quote:

Tegmark's response in[10] (sec VI.A.1) is to offer a new hypothesis "that only Gödel-complete (fully decidable) mathematical structures have physical existence. This drastically shrinks the Level IV multiverse, essentially placing an upper limit on complexity, and may have the attractive side effect of explaining the relative simplicity of our universe." Tegmark goes on to note that although conventional theories in physics are Gödel-undecidable, the actual mathematical structure describing our world could still be Gödel-complete, and "could in principle contain observers capable of thinking about Gödel-incomplete mathematics, just as finite-state digital computers can prove certain theorems about Gödel-incomplete formal systems like Peano arithmetic." In[3] (sec. VII) he gives a more detailed response, proposing as an alternative to MUH the more restricted "Computable Universe Hypothesis" (CUH) which only includes mathematical structures that are simple enough that Gödel's theorem does not require them to contain any undecidable or uncomputable theorems. Tegmark admits that this approach faces "serious challenges", including (a) it excludes much of the mathematical landscape; (b) the measure on the space of allowed theories may itself be uncomputable; and (c) "virtually all historically successful theories of physics violate the CUH".

silence_kit posted:

This view sounds a lot like what the wikipedia page on the philosophy of mathematics calls 'mathematical realism' or 'mathematical platonism'. I suspect that these kinds of views are not very popular on this message board. Probably the average D&D poster is more inclined towards 'mathematical anti-realism' or 'mathematical formalism'.

I would say that a popular view on this forum is likely 'mathematical social constructivism', since on this forum everything and everyone can be reduced to being wholly a product of society. However, paradoxically, it is also often thought on this forum that researchers and scientists should act and do act above the whims of society and that they are kind of like the priests of the modern era.

zoux posted:

I'm going to preface this by saying that obviously climate change is the greatest threat facing humanity today, that it will already lead to hundreds of millions suffering and dying, and if unchecked will lead to the death of billions and the vast majority of all humans. I am in no way trying to deny or downplay the threat of anthropogenic climate change to our species.

But, I see "climate change = human extinction" frequently and I'm genuinely curious what the exact cause for that is considered to be. Toba Catastrophe Theory hypothesizes that at one point the global population was reduced to 10-30k, but that's not extinct. And I'm not saying we'll just bounce back, if we go that low, we're probably never getting past the early agrarian stage again, but does the human extinction theory presuppose a disease or a war precipitated by resource loss, or something else?

Owlofcreamcheese posted:

The point isn't that if 10 ants stand next to each other they create an ant spirit who can then magically take control of them. The point is that ant have many very very simple behaviors that when applied form farm more complex behaviors.

Like ants can build bridges, but no ant knows how to build a bridge. ants just have a few very simple mechanically applied reflexes about freezing in place if another ant touches them a certain way, and clinging and letting go. The individual ant knows nothing about bridges and isn't thinking about bridging, he is thinking "if someone touches me here I extend my legs and grab" but every ant has the same rules and together those rules form a complex engineering system that is not housed in any specific ant.

physeter posted:

Your ant bridge scenario works fine until you get to the first ant.

friendbot2000 posted:

Most social animals seem to have a limited hive mind from what I have read in my near-obsession with zoology and random animal facts. I don't think it is a BORG level hive-mind, but the signs are there.

suck my woke dick posted:

This was an overly popular galaxy brain idea for a while and there's now a bunch of research specifically disproving that you need a hive mind to do swarm behaviour and poo poo.

Owlofcreamcheese posted:

A hive mind is the attributes that the group has that are not the properties that any particular part has.

Most systems have properties above and beyond being just an additive list of the properties the parts have. A watch can tell time but it's just gears, but you can't pull out individual gears and find the part of the gear that tracks minutes. The watch has a property (time keeping) that only exists by the particular configuration of the individual parts.

A hive mind is that swarm behavior can display complex behavior, more complex than any individual could have done that arises from simple rules. It's not a spooky ghost appearing and being the leader and mind controlling the members to execute a plan.

As I have mentioned: you are a hive mind, your cells are just cells, you can do things far beyond what a 100 billion individual brain cells can do if you added up their intelligence. Because you as a unit are the system that arises from the simple mechanical behaviors of cells, as well as being literally physically the individual cells.

suck my woke dick posted:

Uhhhhhhh

No.

Unless you define hivemind as basic observation and communication.

This was an overly popular galaxy brain idea for a while and there's now a bunch of research specifically disproving that you need a hive mind to do swarm behaviour and poo poo.

suck my woke dick posted:

That's... called emergent properties, not hivemind (which implies basically telepathy).

A GIANT PARSNIP posted:

I guess the same goes for world ending technology. Today the world could probably unite and create a disease that wipes us all out. In the year 2218 maybe Canada can do it alone. In 2518 maybe a small group of incels can do it.

Maybe that’s the solution - as tech advances it just gets too easy for a handful of idiots to kill everyone.

radmonger posted:

You really don’t need fossil fuels for any purpose other than ‘being cheaper than things that are not fossil fuels’.

If you don’t have them, you shrug and devote an extra 0.5% of your economy to energy generation via some combination of wood burning, dam building, wind, solar, nuclear or whatever. The idea that it stops you doing anything is the kind of obvious nonsense idea that marks anyone who takes it seriously as innumerate.

Owlofcreamcheese posted:

There is pretty much nothing not made up that could make humans go extinct. There is a lot of humans, they live everywhere. They can survive in basically any conditions. Unless you managed to turn the whole earth to lava or something people are going to keep existing.

Probably not a real mechanism for us to get "blasted back to the stone age" either, no matter how much everything sucks, where we all lose language or existing objects vanish, like there is no realistic situation we end up knapping flint again, instead of using all the axes we already made or digging some copper wire out of some abandoned buildings and cold hammering a new axe. Like even if we got mindwiped and didn't recover till every book is rotted away, there is just so much stuff that contains so much information, even if all that survived was a bag of US state quarters or something you could crib a bunch of ideas on a what a boat looks like and a bad map of the coastline.

DrSunshine posted:

Well. To counterpoint this, there are some kind of big things that might do it, assuming we never get our asses off the planet or climate change reverts us back to a primitive state. A Chicxulub-scale "geological epoch-ending" asteroid or cometary impact would probably do it. As would the slow, eventual transformation of our planet into a barren world via processes of solar evolution.

axeil posted:

tl;dr: there are issues caused by a radical neo-platonic look at the universe, mainly caused by Gödel's Incompleteness Theorems. There might be a solution to that problem where the universe is only made of fully decidable mathematical structures having physical existence. This may or may not be a sufficient rebuttal.

Disclaimer: I didn't really deeply study set theory during my math degree (I focused on statistics and number theory) so I may have misstated some things here. I also haven't done formal, abstract math in almost 10 years so I may have also made some mistakes in logic or describing things. Apologies. I also used wikipedia as a source because I don't have my formal logic books easily accessible and I wanted to try and make this argument without getting too far into formal logic to explain what I was going on about.

And if you got to the bottom of this post, thanks for reading! Hope it was interesting.

Kerning Chameleon posted:

friendbot2000 posted:

Can you send me some of those studiesif you have them on hand? If I am wrong about something I like to correct my facts and having a diving rod is more reliable than blindly googling.

Kerning Chameleon posted:

I know, I know, the argument for the practical benefits of space research get thrown around a lot. I admit it, GPS is pretty kickin' rad, although I find velcro and Tang of all things rather vapid developments that certainly weren't worth the sheer amount of R&D dollars put into them.

But I must ask, what has space done for us lately? I'm serious, please tell me how space exploration developments in the past decade are going to improve me, my life, personally, going forward? Or the rest of society? Climate change monitoring is the only thing I can thing of, and that's space exploitation, not exploration. Cold hard truth is, we've hit the Law of Diminishing Returns when it comes to getting the bang for our bucks in space.

I'm just gonna say it: we need to defund space research and reallocate the funds toward public works and reparations. Yes, I know, military budget. And I agree, cut that too. But ALSO redirect space funding, because every dollar counts in averting a racially charged nuclear climate apocalypse. As Eisenhower so eloquently put it when he vetoed the Apollo project the first go round: "Every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed." Those words echo with resounding, inescapable truth even today.

Yes, some scientific studies have proven societally important in the past. But personally, I think some sciences, including space research, aren't pulling their practical weight these days in the cause of creating a more equitable and prosperous society as much as they used to. And if a science isn't aiding in the progressive cause, they need to shut up, cut the panhandling and get on board with the folks producing real, tangible benefits for the common people. Because if you're not actively help progress society in a real, applied, tangible manner, you're an active detriment by siphoning off direly needed funds and personnel.

axeil posted:

To address this, I don't think you can rebut neo-platonism by saying "I don't think it's a very popular view itt". You don't even have proof it isn't very popular, much less an argument for why something unpopular is wrong.

The Butcher posted:

Basic rear end, fundamental math seems like it should be more universal than language though.

On or off. Yes or no. Thing or not thing. 1 or 0, or whatever you want to use to represent it.

1+1=2 will always come out the same way in this universe no matter how you say the words, no?

The Butcher posted:

Wait, what?

I thought the whole point of math being this interesting in these kinds of topics is that it's NOT up for interpretation.

It seems to be the only thing that always works the same way no matter the reference frame, and can always be reduced to zeros and ones, right down to the rules of how the universe works.

Language is fucky, and can constrain or otherwise frame how things can be understood. Not sure if it's the right term, but math sorta works outside of language. Zero's and ones all the way down.

my dad posted:

No.

BrandorKP posted:

Many worlds is an interpretation of the wave function. The wave function is the math.

Furthermore math is language. It (math) is just symbols we came up with to talk about what we observe of reality. It's our created tool.

LtStorm posted:

Go read Eisenhower's Chances for Peace speech again and pay better attention to what kind of rockets he's talking about. Also read about Eisenhower in general. Particularly how he, you know, was the guy that founded NASA.

Speaking of NASA, they can defend themselves fine--here's an article about how research in space and for space travel is currently benefiting us back here on the ground.

LtStorm posted:

Also your views on science are myopic and nonsensical.

suck my woke dick posted:

If all NASA ever achieved was pretty pictures and cool science with no obvious applications they‘d still be a worthwhile program to support at the current funding level.

MSDOS KAPITAL posted:

So I wouldn't say that it can't happen, but you're painting it here as this "well obviously" sort of thing that's beneath you to even demonstrate. That's not true.

Kerning Chameleon posted:

Yes, some scientific studies have proven societally important in the past.

suck my woke dick posted:

People have started simulating how to complex swarm behaviours emerge from simple rules for individuals pretty much since computers became affordable for university departments to buy. The dead simple but surprisingly functional early models are exemplified by Boids which have literally three rules: don't crash, don't stray from the group, match everyone else's heading. This is obviously extremely simplified, but is sufficient to produce swarm behaviour that looks realistic to the human observer and is used for introductory teaching and producing CGI of swarms for movies and bideo james.

More advanced research has been using 2D and 3D tracking to actually measure which behavioural inputs individuals respond to and then modelled swarms using those rules with increasing success, e.g. what guides honeybee swarms, how starlings form flocks above their roosting sites, and obviously fish swarms.

Lately, by getting brogrammers to make us some useful products , we've become able to take into account e.g. individual variation/"personality", how vision or lack thereof mediates who can follow whose behaviour rather than assuming everyone is informed about everything like in early models, with implications for collective decisionmaking of the group and the relevant individual contributions. Modelling is now able to match actual observed behaviour to an increasing extent even in relatively smart species and complex environments and we can make informed statements about systems other than traditional swarms.