Hey, hey, Chris - no need for that. That's just Jacques' manner and he's the
only one it need concern. He is a very useful, if repetitive, member of this
group and I would hate it if an ad hominem attack made him unsubscribe. Stay
here, Jacques, we need you.
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Christopher Maloney [SMTP:dude.domain.name.hidden]
> Sent: Saturday, June 19, 1999 8:45 PM
> To: everything-list
> Subject: Re: Craziness of a quantum suicidal
>
> Jacques M Mallah wrote:
> >
> > On Fri, 18 Jun 1999, Christopher Maloney wrote:
> > > The whole time, I knew that only one thing would be certain: that I
> > > would survive. But I didn't know by which avenue I would escape. So
> >
> > Chris Maloney - the latest, and worst, addition to our little
> > group. It's not exactly a pleasure to make your acquaintance.
>
> Jacques, I'm so glad that you decided to respond to me directly
> at last! First let me say this: Fuck you, you pathetic piece
> of shit! I wrote two posts directly to you in the recent past,
> hoping to engage you in a meaningful discussion of QTI: see
> http://www.escribe.com/science/theory/index.html?mID=706 and
> http://www.escribe.com/science/theory/index.html?mID=754. In that
> last post I even invited you to "show me why I am stupid". But
> only when I decided to write something a little bit personal did
> you decide to respond in a scornful, derisive manner. Why is
> that?
>
> I won't respond to the technical issues, "the facts" that you
> listed in your post, because I would just be repeating the stuff
> I wrote in the above two posts. I still wish you'd respond to
> them.
>
> It's interesting, isn't it, how people can disagree so
> fundamentally sometimes? I sympathize with what you expressed
> about your frustration in trying to convince someone of what
> seems to be obvious to you. I've experienced that myself.
> Now, I'd like to think that I'm a fairly good thinker. And I
> think that you are, about some things, having read lots of
> your posts from the past. I particularly liked your
> explications on the pointlessness of the "free will" debate,
> and I agree with them wholeheartedly.
>
> So let me give you some advice, because I'm still seething
> here -- when you feel that frustration coming up again, just
> stuff it. Either ignore the post altogether, which is
> something that I do quite often, or respond thoughtfully and
> respectfully. I do, personally, believe that there is a
> thing called truth out there, and I know that you'd like to
> know it as much as I would. 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.
> But I'm not stupid, and I don't believe you are either.
>
>
>
> > I suspect
> > I will unsubscribe from this newsgroup before long. I'm a scientist,
> not
> > a suicide counselor.
>
> I didn't ask for any counseling.
>
> > Much like many others on this list, you have no understanding of
> > issues that are really simple. But then the human capacity for
> stupidity
> > never ceases to amaze me. For example, I am currently in an email
> debate
> > with someone who claims to have a counterexample to Bell's theorem - a
> > non-MWI, local hidden variables model to explain Bell correlations. The
> > only problem: the way he takes expectation values, with a funny
> > probability distribution, the average value of a certain quantity is 1
> > even though the probability that this quantity will be nonzero is zero.
> > To me this is the very definition of reductio ad absurdum, but
> he
> > thinks it is just an insult to call his beliefs absurd! This guy is not
> > kidding, he is an employed engineer and I still can't get my mind around
> > the fact that he is so incredibly stupid. IT ... IS ... JUST ... NOT
> ...
> > POSSIBLE! But, it is true. %*^~$%(&!
> > But this is not atypical of my experiences on the internet of
> > trying to convince crackpots of their errors. Be it magnetism,
> > thermodynamics, quantum mechanics, or quantum suicide, these people just
> > won't understand what I tell them.
> > So, I really don't expect to convince you either.
> >
> > But consider this: Is the branch in which you win the lottery
> not
> > already occupied? How will it profit this lottery winner if you,
> finding
> > yourself in another branch, kill yourself?
> > Your belief that you will magically leap into the body of this
> > winner, at the same date and time as you die, is absurd. You guys take
> > one true fact - that the effective probability of finding yourself to be
> > that winning guy, given that you find the date and time to be such and
> > such, and that your name is such and such, etc. - is nearly one. But
> you
> > don't understand what it means and you sure as hell don't use it
> > correctly, and the result is this monstrous quantum cult of death.
> > The facts are, and I've said this a million times by now:
> > - There is only one reason to commit suicide and it is the same as
> > without QM: if your life is so bad that you would rather not exist,
> commit
> > suicide; otherwise don't. For indeed, in those branches you would cease
> > to exist, while the branches with the lottery winner would gain nothing.
> > - the effective probability of finding yourself to be that guy,
> > given that your name is such and such, is still very small. If you did
> > follow though, most of the the observers with that name would find
> > themselves prior to that date.
> > - The effective probability of having that name, given that you
> are
> > an observer after that date, would be greatly reduced by the suicide.
> > - Your total measure would be reduced, so there would be less
> > observers with that name in the ensemble, and the total number of
> > observers would be less.
> > - There is only one reason to commit suicide and it is the same as
> > without QM: if your life is so bad that you would rather not exist,
> commit
> > suicide; otherwise don't. For indeed, in those branches you would cease
> > to exist, while the branches with the lottery winner would gain nothing.
> >
> > > Now I actually care too much about somebody else -- my wife. I
> > > couldn't kill myself now, knowing how much it would hurt her.
> > >
> > > So now I take my lumps as they come. That sounds like maturity
> >
> > No, it sounds like you now have too much to lose. A condition
> > which may not last.
> >
> > - - - - - - -
> > 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/
>
> --
> Chris Maloney
> http://www.chrismaloney.com
>
> "Knowledge is good"
> -- Emil Faber
Received on Mon Jun 21 1999 - 03:24:30 PDT