Subject: Ackanomic Research Digest V2 #35
From: [email-masked] (Ackanomic Research Digest)
To: acka-research-digest

Ackanomic Research Digest   Thursday, April 10 1997   Volume 02 : Number 035

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Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 00:05:45 -0500 (CDT)
From: Thierry Joffrain <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka:  Proposal 1911 

>Proposal 1911
>Double Double Your Enjoyment

This is a great proposal and I'd like to see it again with just a few things
changed. However, I urge everyone to vote NO on this in its current form.

Not only would this be a way to make mega bucks by simply going on vacation
and then acting hurt, but the following breaks my heart:

>No player may be the Evil Twin of more than one other player. It's not as if
>one can bend the laws of biology as easily as cows eat grass...

Arrrrrrgh! I'm a biological freak! And so is ThinMan.

This would also be a big problem for the krykec part of the W-File pair,
where diversity of players can only be reached if people have multiple
twins. I also note that it is possible to have more than one twin brother or
sister. 8 happens sometimes. 6 all same sex and identical is the record I
believe. If you made it that it wasn't illegal, but that players with more
than one twin were also called "biological freaks" then that would be ok I
guess.     : )

You can call me Al, you are looking at it again I believe?

>BLAST! I hereby retract Proposal 1911 for technical reasons. I'll resubmit
>momentarily (big deal).

I'd very much appreciate the above comments being taken into account. I'd
really really hate to have to ditch one of my two beloved twins.

Calvin N Hobbes
one of two biological freaks

------------------------------

Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 00:10:33 -0500 (CDT)
From: Jason Orendorff <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: TMBwG

> Part of what Godel proved is that any such system is sufficient to
> create *indirect* self-reference, and is therefore vulnerable to his
> Incompleteness argument.
	Wow, is that true?  How?

- -- Mohammed
curious

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 22:38:48 -0700 (PDT)
From: Brian Raiter <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: TMBwG

>> Part of what Godel proved is that any such system is sufficient to
>> create *indirect* self-reference, and is therefore vulnerable to his
>> Incompleteness argument.
> 	Wow, is that true?  How?

Never read Hofstadter, I take it? "Godel, Escher, Bach" is almost
entirely about the power of indirect self-reference.

Without going into a huge morass of detail - the proof is difficult to
understand in all its glory - basically he showed how the axioms and
laws of Peano arithmetic could be encoded as integers, and as simple
arithmetic operations on those integers. This allowed Godel to then
create logical statements about integers that had the added effect of
also making statements about Peano arithmetic itself. There is no
special trick to encoding logical statements as numbers, and therefore
any "sufficiently complex" formal system is susceptible to Godel's
attack.

To really simplify, what Godel did was to create the statement: "This
specially chosen integer cannot be derived using any combination of
these arithmetic operations." If you then looked at its translation,
you then saw that his statement was *also* saying: "This specially
chosen logical statement cannot be proved using the laws of Peano
arithmetic." But "this specially chosen statement" was none other than
the original statement Godel began with. Thus, his statment ultimately
says "I cannot be proven."

The problem then comes when you try to decide if it is true or
false. If you decide it is false, then that means the statement "I
cannot be proven" is also false. Which means that it *can* be proven,
and therefore Peano arithmetic can be used to prove false statements!
That is a very bad thing for a formal system's usefulness. But then,
if it is true, then it cannot be proven. And therefore Peano
arithmetic contains true statements that cannot be proven.

b

------------------------------

Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 10:00:20 -0400 (EDT)
From: Matt Miller <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: TM& NSBwG

On Tue, 8 Apr 1997, Brian Raiter wrote:

> The use of levels doesn't get you anything. Remember that Godel proved
> Incompleteness for any system that was as complex as Peano arithmetic,
> which only includes zero, the positive integers, and addition (with
> multiplication and exponents derived from there).
> 
> Part of what Godel proved is that any such system is sufficient to
> create *indirect* self-reference, and is therefore vulnerable to his
> Incompleteness argument.
> 
> b
> 

Yeah, but that's a lot harder to show! ;) I didn't want to have to do that
work.  I was hoping that Mohammed would come up with an explicitly
self-referential system.  That saves me the trouble of showing how to
"encode" self-referential statements in seemingly nonselfreferential
systems.

IB
but breadbox makes an excelent point that I was perhaps not clear on 

------------------------------

Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 19:41:50 +0000
From: "Bascule" <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: CFJ 370 (fnord)

Here we go... BWG gone mad...

Malenkai wrote:
> Can you say that piece of art A, is objectively better than piece
> B, or is art 100% subjective?  I would argue that the 'obvious'
> answer that art is 100% subjective is not so obvious.

Can you expand on this? I'd say, quite predictably, that art is 100%
subjective. I'd attribute similarities in artistic taste to
similarities in the observers, parhaps from simliarities in their
cultural or genetic backgrounds. If an alien race was discovered 
(perhaps I should say invented :-)) would they have any similarities 
to our own artistic taste? If yes, then I'd put it down to some 
function of evolution. But perhaps this is just _too_ speculative

> I think its more that terminology, though, its an attitude.  I remember
> when I first started reading Roger Penrose (a mathematical physicist and
> Platonist), and *thinking* that way was so much clearer.  How's that
> for useless BWG :)

I find this a good argument in favour of Platonism! Use what works.
Every day, and even throughout this discussion, I fall back on
Platonist thinking and descriptions of true and false. To frame
everything in pragmatic terms is a pain in the @$$. Rather than say
"this is true" you have to say something like "using the scientific
method as I understand it this statement is useful because it
approximates this evidence to an acceptable degree and makes the
following falsifiable and useful predictions..." However I find it
useful to do this when thinking about scientific theories, because
it automatically forces you to think about the evidence that has led
to the theory etc etc. 

> I do not find it inconceivable that the entire Platonic "game
> state" is knowable.

This statement bothers me, because despite myself, I probably agree
with it. Unlike the universe, we are starting by knowing the rules.
So assuming that we all use English in the same way for the purpose
of interpreting the rules (how valid is this assumption?) then I
guess you would predict a unique outcome, even if the opinions of
players lead to uncertainty in CFJ verdicts. Damn :)

> It went something like 'assume objective truth as a premise' and it 
> is tautological, but assume subjectivity, and you really don't know 
> anything.  It boiled down to the old Objectivist-Kant war in the end,
> and although I regrettably do not remember how it went, the Objectivist
> belief self-validates somehow, perhaps trivially, whereas the subjective
> side cannot ever validate itself.  So why not believe something that
> could be logically consistent.  I wish I could dredge it up better.

There's a quote from Tolstoy, which is something like "The only thing 
a man can know is that he knows nothing" although I'm sure Tolstoy 
put it better. I don't think that that conclusion is as terminal as 
it sounds at first; in fact I don't think it matters at all! Use what 
_works_.
 
> > And my reply is that I don't care if I am wrong
> 
> Good, seeing as how you cannot be right ;-) ;-)

Good point!

> Malenkai
> BBWG (blathering Bandwidth-Wasting Gizz)

Bascule
BBBWG (Blatantly Blathering Bandwidth-Wasting Gizz)

------------------------------

Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 19:47:47 +0000
From: "Bascule" <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: CFJ 370 (fnord)

> This statement bothers me, because despite myself, I probably agree
> with it. Unlike the universe, we are starting by knowing the rules.
> So assuming that we all use English in the same way for the purpose
> of interpreting the rules (how valid is this assumption?) then I
> guess you would predict a unique outcome, even if the opinions of
> players lead to uncertainty in CFJ verdicts. Damn :)

I've probably just contradicted myself there, all within the same 
sentence.

Humph.

Bascule

------------------------------

Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 15:04:21 -0700 (PDT)
From: Brian Raiter <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: CFJ 370 (fnord)

>> I do not find it inconceivable that the entire Platonic "game
>> state" is knowable.
> 
> This statement bothers me, because despite myself, I probably agree
> with it. Unlike the universe, we are starting by knowing the rules.
> So assuming that we all use English in the same way for the purpose
> of interpreting the rules (how valid is this assumption?) then I
> guess you would predict a unique outcome, even if the opinions of
> players lead to uncertainty in CFJ verdicts. Damn :)

But how valid *is* that assumption? English is just not an exact
language. Admittedly, we try to limit ourselves to relatively precise
terms in the ruleset. (Er - well, most of the time we do.) But that
can only go so far. I'm not so sure that there is a single, "knowable"
game state. In fact I would not be surprised if a Platonist viewed the
game state as being like a quantum-probability cloud. That is, you
could know the *probability* of the game being in one particular
state, but the question of what the game state actually *is* would be
meaningless.

(Perhaps such a view would also make "game threads" more palatable....)

breadbox
guiltily wondering how much this discussion contributed to wilma's crash

------------------------------

Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 18:00:46 -0500 (CDT)
From: Jason Orendorff <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka:  They Might Be Godel?

> Never read Hofstadter, I take it? "Godel, Escher, Bach" is almost
> entirely about the power of indirect self-reference.
	My girlfriend's father offered it to me to borrow, but I was too 
busy.. :o)  Lots of coincidences this week.

> if it is true, then it cannot be proven. And therefore Peano
> arithmetic contains true statements that cannot be proven.
	I have seen this before in Gardner but it's been a while.  I'll
have to go look it over.  Some of his stuff struck me as a little
arbitrary at the time. 

- -- Mohammed

------------------------------

Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 18:30:46 -0500 (CDT)
From: "Joseph W. DeVincentis" <devjoe>
Subject: Acka: Wilma (was CFJ 370 (fnord))

breadbox signed a message in the CFJ 370 thread with:
> breadbox
> guiltily wondering how much this discussion contributed to wilma's crash

I don't know, it *is* possible that the heavy load on the root disk
due to the heavy mail traffic from the list affected that drive, but
I doubt it.  There were about 75 messages a day, sent to an average of
about 30 different addresses, for almost 400 days, which means that
sendmail's log files for individual messages were written to disk
900,000 times, but probably 90% of those writes were cached and never
actually written to disk, and 90,000 extra writes/deletions over a period
of a year I just don't think is significant.  The web server generates
more reads than that, and longer ones, though those are from the other
drive, and the number of writes is much less.

And by the way, I'm done with the upgrade.  Happy bandwidth-wasting to all.

/dev/joe

------------------------------

Date: Wed, 09 Apr 1997 19:33:13 -0400
From: Malenkai <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: CFJ 370 (fnord)

Brian Raiter wrote:

> I'm not so sure that there is a single, "knowable"
> game state. In fact I would not be surprised if a Platonist viewed the
> game state as being like a quantum-probability cloud. That is, you
> could know the *probability* of the game being in one particular
> state, but the question of what the game state actually *is* would be
> meaningless.

That seems to be a reasonable way to put it.  I like to think of it 
in terms of probability packets hiding about waiting to be have their
wavefunctions popped.  The effect of that chalice vault rule comes to
mind sometimes as an example ;)

> (Perhaps such a view would also make "game threads" more palatable....)

If threads weren't such a hassle to play, they'd be more palatable too. :)

Malenkai

------------------------------

Date: Wed, 09 Apr 1997 20:29:09 -0400
From: Malenkai <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: CFJ 370 (fnord)

** warning BBBBBWG **

Bascule wrote:

> Malenkai wrote:
> > Can you say that piece of art A, is objectively better than piece
> > B, or is art 100% subjective?  I would argue that the 'obvious'
> > answer that art is 100% subjective is not so obvious.
> 
> Can you expand on this? I'd say, quite predictably, that art is 100%
> subjective. [...] But perhaps this is just _too_ speculative

Well, my argument here has always been quite speculative.  In years of
exposing myself to various forms of art (rock and heavy metal music,
and architecture mostly), it has always been blatently obvious that
some of it is better than others, in a sense stronger than what can be 
explained away by merely by "taste".  Also, stuff I write when "truly
inspired" turns out "better" than the common gizz that usually comes
out.  Generally, but not always, the more effort, the better results.

The question is then, how to explain this feeling in a reasonably rational
way that some art quality is not 100% subjective.  I've always tried to
explain it in terms of information provided, under the assumption that
information is an objective, Platonic entity.  The art or music, based
on its composition, arrangement, lyrics, or whatever that provides more
information is better.  This also accounts for the fact, at least with
me, that music that is overplayed seems to become boring (as it is 
conveying less information to me each time I hear it), and may seem worse
than a new piece.  However, play the new piece, which is worse, the same
amount of times, and it will seem much worse than piece A.  Think
of art as information capacitors, and those whose RC decays over the 
longest amount of time is the best.  You can always say, objectively,
that one capacitor in a circut has more capacitance than another.  Then
think of those truly great pieces whose slope of decay is so gradual that
you do not notice it over a lifetime.  Admittedly, there is a large
component of subjective "taste" to skew the model, but I am arguing there
is *some* non-zero onjective component, and that component is information
delivered.

Now, there seems to be a case where something may be providing alot of
information, but you are just not interested in that information.  For
example, this discourse between us is probably providing more information
than some other BWG (but probably less than most :-), but it may not seem
that "good" to many people, because they are not really interested, if
they are reading it at all (as a seperate note, I have always wondered who
read what, and if anyone else was like me and read everything).  That is
really where taste comes in, imho, and that has nothing to do with the
quality of the art.  Take your aliens -- they come in with their music,
and we don't want to deal with it, we pass it off as garbage, much 
worse than ours.  Based on my argument, this would not be because it is
of lower quality, but because either we are not interested in the 
information being provided, or more likely, do not know or understand the
syntax or semantics (language, if you will) of its delivery medium, thus
are unable to get the information.  For example, the polyryhtmic music
of West Africa has not caught on much in America not because it is of
lower quality, but because we are syntactically not accustomed to it.

An experiment I've always wanted to try was to take 10 pieces of western
music, and play it for a western audience a few times, and get that
audience to rank the pieces, thus producing some sort of ranking of
the pieces.  Then play the pieces for an audience that has never been
exposed to that style a few times, and see if they come up with similar
rankings.  If we had aliens on hand, it would be a cool experiment :)
This has probably been done, I wonder what the results are, if they would
support my hypothesis.

Well, you asked for an expounding :)

> Bascule
> BBBWG (Blatantly Blathering Bandwidth-Wasting Gizz)

Malenkai
BBBBBWG (Bombarded by Blatantly Blathering Bandwidth-Wasting Gizz)

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 03:36:41 +0000
From: "Bascule" <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Pure BWG [Was: CFJ 370 (fnord)]

** ACHTUNG! BBBBBBBWG! **

Malenkai wrote:
> Well, my argument here has always been quite speculative.  In years of
> exposing myself to various forms of art (rock and heavy metal music,
> and architecture mostly), it has always been blatently obvious that
> some of it is better than others, in a sense stronger than what can be 
> explained away by merely by "taste".  Also, stuff I write when "truly
> inspired" turns out "better" than the common gizz that usually comes
> out.  Generally, but not always, the more effort, the better results.
[snip - about information in music]

It all comes down to the same point again, unfortunately (we're going
to have to find something else to disagree on Malenkai, to up the
Gizz stakes still further). I agree with what you say, but still
describe it as subjective, just because my viewpoint allows no
concept of objectivity. I'm sure you would agree that lots of people
coming to the same conclusion doesn't make that conclusion
objective. Although I'm sure you'd say that because lots of people 
agree makes it likely that they have discovered the truth (sigh)

On a slightly different tack, it intrigues me that African rhythms 
haven't caught on in America. I'm a big fan of modern Jazz, which is 
unusual in the UK, none of my mates like my music or have even heard 
of the artists I like, who are generally European or American. I 
believe that the likes of Michael Brecker, David Sanborn et al. are 
quite big stars over your way; I remember seeing them play at 
Clinton's inauguration ceremony. But back to Africa, there's a fine 
tradition of Jazz borrowing African rhythms, Hugh Masekela (how do 
you spell his name???) springs to mind, while Salif Kieta and Youssou 
N'Dour are African musicians producing accessible stuff. More 
mainstream, I believe Peter Gabriel works with African musicians a 
lot. As for Metal, I've never quite seen the attraction, especially 
with this Glam-rock nonsense.

I've changed the subject line as I can no longer see even the most 
tenuous link here with fnord's CFJ :) I hope Wilma is up to this...

> Malenkai
> BBBBBWG (Bombarded by Blatantly Blathering Bandwidth-Wasting Gizz)

Bascule
BBBBBBBWG (Beleaguredly Being Bombarded by Blatantly Blathering
Bandwidth-Wasting Gizz) 

------------------------------

Date: Wed, 09 Apr 1997 23:37:07 -0400
From: Malenkai <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Pure BWG

** BBBBBBBWGBB alert **

Bascule wrote:

> I'm sure you would agree that lots of people coming to the same
> conclusion doesn't make that conclusion objective. Although I'm sure
> you'd say that because lots of people agree makes it likely that
> they have discovered the truth (sigh)

Well, I'd agree with the first, but not the second.  I've seen 'The
Emperor's New Clothes' in RL.  However, when an Objectivist sees a 
pattern, such as lots of people coming to the same conclusion, they
try to find a rational explanation for the phenomona.  Since I find
informatation to be a Platonic quantity, and art a medium of information
delivery, I find art A can be objectively better than art B.  I still
admit, however, that this does boil down to a faith anchor, thus agree
that this thread is quite exausted, but cannot really think of anything
else to argue about.  Now that we have CFJ 371, however, perhaps we can
pick at that a bit ;).
 
> On a slightly different tack, it intrigues me that African rhythms
> haven't caught on in America. I'm a big fan of modern Jazz,

The problem with modern jazz, at least where I live, is that you have
to weed through so much gizz to hear anything good on the radio.  Jazz
has no where near the commercial penetration as mainstream rock (which
the record companies in the States are now calling 'modern' or 
'alternative' rock.  There was a time, in the '80s, when those terms
actually meant something).   

> I believe that the likes of Michael Brecker, David Sanborn et al. are
> quite big stars over your way; I remember seeing them play at
> Clinton's inauguration ceremony. But back to Africa, there's a fine
> tradition of Jazz borrowing African rhythms, Hugh Masekela (how do
> you spell his name???) springs to mind, while Salif Kieta and Youssou
> N'Dour are African musicians producing accessible stuff.

I would bet that, in America, the first album by one mediocre (but highly
promoted by the record company) band, 'Hootie and the Blowfish' has
outsold the entire catalog of all the artists you have just mentioned.
Despite the fact that it is accessable, radio station program directors
are not accessing it.  I have one Youssou N'Dour CD; the problem with it
is that there is so much tape hiss on it from the original master.  The
record companies simply haven't bothered to put much money into promotion
and distibution of this stuff, so you don't hear too much of it around
these parts.  
 
> More mainstream, I believe Peter Gabriel works with African musicians a
> lot.

There was a time when it was a bit fadish to work with African musicians,
such as Peter Gabriel introducing the world to Youssou N'Dour, and 
Paul Simon working with various South and West African musicians on
'Graceland'.  That was an '80s thing, I think, and you don't hear much
of it anymore (at least I don't).  A much better bet, imho, is Johnny
Clegg and Savuka, for western-accessable African music.

> As for Metal, I've never quite seen the attraction, especially
> with this Glam-rock nonsense.

Well, it depends on the rythym section (especially the bass player) and
lyrics with metal bands.  Admittedly, most of them are garbage, but
well done metal is better than well done anything else.

Since I'm listening to 'Meat Loaf' as I write this, I probably should not
be expressing my musicial opinions, but WtH (btw, no one writes a better
song than Jim Steinman).

> I've changed the subject line as I can no longer see even the most
> tenuous link here with fnord's CFJ :) I hope Wilma is up to this... 
I think we've changed the subject too.  Perhaps we can get to 'TMBG',
like the other thread managed to get to somehow. :)
  
> Bascule
> BBBBBBBWG (Beleaguredly Being Bombarded by Blatantly Blathering
> Bandwidth-Wasting Gizz)

Malenkai
BBBBBBBWGBB (Beleaguredly Being Bombarded by Blatantly Blathering
Bandwidth-Wasting Gizz by Bascule)

------------------------------

End of Ackanomic Research Digest V2 #35
***************************************