Re: Craziness of a quantum suicidal

From: Jacques M Mallah <jqm1584.domain.name.hidden>
Date: Sun, 20 Jun 1999 15:37:55 -0400

On Sat, 19 Jun 1999, Christopher Maloney wrote:
> I wonder if it's because of the fact that
> I'm a newcomer to the group that you resent me.

        No but I will admit one thing. When you first showed up, I hoped
you might be a positive addition, a potential ally against this madness.
Naturally I was dissapointed when you started spouting that suicide crap
and it became clear that you were the most serious crackpot yet about it
and had no potential for meaningful discussions with me. This
dissapointment probably affected my post.

> You really did offend me in your original "Craziness" post. Not
> because you think the idea was crazy, but because of this statement:
>
> Chris Maloney - the latest, and worst, addition to our little
> group. It's not exactly a pleasure to make your acquaintance.
>
> I mean - you didn't even direct it at me, but you were verbally
> rolling your eyes about me to the rest of the group. And this:

        Actually I did direct it at you.

> But then the human capacity for stupidity
> never ceases to amaze me.
>
> I, for one, feel amazed that you continue to insult me after my
> repeated attempts to communicate respectfully.

        It's no insult. It's true and therefore not slander. I do not
insult people or say things just to upset them unless I am provoked.
Neither do I coddle people or pretend to respect them when I do not. If a
toddler makes a scribble I say 'very nice', but I expect an adult to take
my real opinion.

> You've betrayed yourself in significant ways in this last post.
> First of all, you said that you didn't respond to my two technical
> posts because they said nothing new, yet you did respond to Hal,
> who wrote basically the same things I had been writing.

        I had also not wanted to get into it since I have a lot to do, but
once I was responding anyway it made sense to throw in some technical
stuff which would serve as a response to both of you at once.

> Don't you think that maybe
> you could be wrong? I was trying to make the point that, let's say
> from a "bird perspective", if you saw two intelligent people bashing
> it out about an issue, and disagreeing at a fundamental level, that
> one of them must be wrong. But *both* have similar feelings that
> the other is being just plain stupid, and not thinking clearly.
> That person in the bird perspective would have no a priori reason
> to think that one or the other is wrong, and is stupid. If you'll
> grant that I have similar feelings about your position on this
> issue (I do), *how* can you be so certain that it's you and not me
> that's right?

        The same way I know anything, from the specifics of the case. If
I had no other information besides the fact that I disagree with someone,
then I would agree that I could be wrong. But then, with no other info,
no disagreement would be possible since I wouldn't know the question. But
I do have other info and am certain of the answer.

> But I really can't believe that you didn't respond to this part
> of my post, or didn't get it at all:
>
> If we disagree, it must be
> because either we're starting from different premises, or
> one of our logical reasoning is flawed, or perhaps one of
> us is biased in our thinking in a way that we are unaware of.

        Starting from premises which are not fully understood is much like
bias, but full understanding of the premises often only comes once we know
how they play out. And flawed logic is hard to seperate from different
premises in many cases except in the most clear cut case of an algebraic
mixup or the like. I think your reasoning is flawed - you use measure
one way to get quantum probabilities, but reject it in other contexts -
but it's hard to prove to you that it's not just different premises.
        And if someone insists on holding to a position he can always make
it a postulate and say 'postulates just come down to intuition and so mine
are as good as yours'. In other words, religion.

> Poor you! You must be awfully altruistic, to bear the burden of
> talking all of us poor, deluded souls out of our madness. It
> seems to me strange that you care so much -- judging from your
> other personality traits, I'd expect you to chuckle if any of us
> actually went through with it.

        Evidently your model of me does not successfully predict the
'strange' behavior. I suggest you revise it.
        But my altruism does have limits and as I said I will probably
leave the group soon. Believe it or not I do not enjoy discussing ideas
that I hate and would rather talk about something interesting. QS is
important but no more technically interesting to me than an extended
discussion of the proposition that 1+1=3. (But then 0 would equal to 1, I
say; it must be wrong. No, they say, there is only one zero therefore
0=1. Etc. ad nauseum.)

                         - - - - - - -
              Jacques Mallah (jqm1584.domain.name.hidden)
       Graduate Student / Many Worlder / Devil's Advocate
"I know what no one else knows" - 'Runaway Train', Soul Asylum
            My URL: http://pages.nyu.edu/~jqm1584/
Received on Sun Jun 20 1999 - 12:38:49 PDT

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