Re: Raatikainen's critique of Chaitin
From: Craig Feinstein (cafeinst_at_msn.com)
Date: 09/07/04
- Next message: Arthur J. O'Dwyer: "Re: Definition of Axiom of Choice?"
- Previous message: N.C.: "Re: Quotient rings - help!"
- In reply to: Eray Ozkural exa: "Re: Raatikainen's critique of Chaitin"
- Next in thread: Eray Ozkural exa: "Re: Raatikainen's critique of Chaitin"
- Reply: Eray Ozkural exa: "Re: Raatikainen's critique of Chaitin"
- Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ]
Date: 6 Sep 2004 18:22:43 -0700
erayo@bilkent.edu.tr (Eray Ozkural exa) wrote in message news:<fa69ae35.0409060859.22b28496@posting.google.com>...
> Robin Chapman <rjc@ivorynospamtower.freeserve.co.uk> wrote in message news:<chh5tg$grp$1@south.jnrs.ja.net>...
> > >> The fact is that mathematicians read Chaitin and see no striking, deep
> > >> nor relevant (to their work) conclusions.
> > >
> > > Not necessarily because there are no striking deep nor relevant
> > > conclusions but more because they don't understand them.
> >
> > Because his theorems are exactly the results you would
> > expect in the context; footnotes to Godel, Church and Turing.
>
> Footnotes. You call his AIT monograph a collection of footnotes? There
> are some quite serious and elegant theorems there. I wonder what you
> are working on that you would not call "footnotes to X" then.
>
> I can call all of 20th century mathematics as footnotes to Pythagoras,
> or all philosophy as footnotes to Plato and Aristotle... How accurate
> would that be except being an amusing reflection of the intricate
> relations to history? As I detected before, this thread has
> degenerated into a mudfest. Maybe you need another version of Peter
> Olcott to busy yourselves with! You are too accustomed to flamewars,
> rather than conducting sincere investigation of X's work.
>
> Besides, I think Chaitin has shown a great deal of effort in humility,
> he attributes the fundamental ideas to such great minds as Leibniz and
> Borel in his book "Omega". His work indeed seems like formalization of
> Leibniz's statements, and has relevance also to questions asked by
> Godel.
>
> In some philosophy papers, much less rigorous and "intuitive"
> arguments about epistemology were given. For instance Putnam's
> somewhat horrid arguments about any computation being anywhere. It's
> always funny to watch how people resist to strong arguments, and have
> no difficulty with weak arguments when it suits them.
>
> Your posts made me realize that my task is much more difficult than it
> seems. I want to erase Platonist tendencies from mathematics, e.g.
> decisively eliminate the idea of God and heaven. If you can't
> understand that Chaitin's results elaborately show that there is
> randomness in the heart of mathematics and idealized reasoning in
> general, *then* it would be impossible for folks like you to
> appreciate that mathematical realism is bankrupt. Chaitin's work is
> not just a collection of footnotes, I think.
>
> Regards,
I thought we were on the same side. If you want to decisively
eliminate the idea of God and heaven, then we're not on the same team.
I think Chaitin's work demonstrates that there are some facts that
only God can have access to, which is good for us to know, as it
forces us to be humble if we are to be honest with ourselves.
Craig
- Next message: Arthur J. O'Dwyer: "Re: Definition of Axiom of Choice?"
- Previous message: N.C.: "Re: Quotient rings - help!"
- In reply to: Eray Ozkural exa: "Re: Raatikainen's critique of Chaitin"
- Next in thread: Eray Ozkural exa: "Re: Raatikainen's critique of Chaitin"
- Reply: Eray Ozkural exa: "Re: Raatikainen's critique of Chaitin"
- Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ]
Relevant Pages
|
