So although they also do the technocratic thing on the front page, they have a balancing effect in the general contributor diaries looking at things from the other end of the telescope. So the site has a more personal feel.
We have very few personal experience diaries here, I've written a few (some of which were very personal and I had some offline criticism over them), but there have been others. rg's series on music is a wonderful example that it isn't just a girl-thing. But, generally, technocratic is the site's comfort zone. keep to the Fen Causeway
I also feel if I have not a few links to back up my opinions it's better not to post them.
:D
Honest to god, when I post here, I post the most personal stuff in the world. I post insane opinions unacceptable in most circles, which are only now becoming accepted here because I've continued to post them. Certainly not everything I write is based on facts and figures. I realize I am the last person who should be giving advice on the subject (but maybe all of my experience has made me wise - how do you know?) But if you have something you are passionate about and you think would be beneficial to impart to the world, and a great outlet like ET to use for your medium, go for it. Of all the people here besides J, you've probably made the biggest investment in ET. I don't think you should have to feel the way you do. "Pretending that you already know the answer when you don't is not actually very helpful." ~Migeru.
They say men prefer to talk about events in terms of problems and solutions. Maybe women prefer to talk about events in terms of personal experiences. I have no idea if there is any truth in that.
BTW, I wanted to tell you, there was a trans-gendered girl on America's Next Top Model this season. It's probably lame that I feel the need to tell you that. But I thought it was interesting. "Pretending that you already know the answer when you don't is not actually very helpful." ~Migeru.
I was aware of the Isis thing, and but I know that she was on the receiving end of some of the very unkind commentary, both by her fellow contestants as well as the more cerebrally challenged of the US commentariat.
As for the difference about how men and women approach things, again, I think it's true as a tendency across populations, but not necessarily for individuals. I have a female friend who keeps telling me her problems and I sense her frustration when I try to "solve" them for her when she really just wants sympathy. But equally I don't think she quite gets how distressing it is for me to listen to her problems and not be able to help cos she won't take advice. keep to the Fen Causeway
She is probably the most prominent lesbian "feminist" writer in the UK and never hesitates to give the transgendered a kicking. And when we, who have no such pulpit from which to transmit our distress, protest we're told we're bullying and silencing her views.
The most annoying thing is that Stonewall are powerful enough that they have managed to actually get two prominent transgender advocacy organisations to back down on protests. There is a suspicion that some people were told their career prospects in the wider LGB community were under threat if the protests became "official", so we got shafted. keep to the Fen Causeway
But if you have something you are passionate about and you think would be beneficial to impart to the world, and a great outlet like ET to use for your medium, go for it.
Well said.
Fran, if someone tries to say your personal experience can be disproved - that's their problem. But if you presented your personal experience as proving something general, they are entitled to question that. You would only need to back up your report on your own experience with links to evidence if you were claiming some general significance. If not - as poemless says - "go for it". Maybe it's because I'm a Londoner - that I moved to Nice.
links that proved that science showed that my experiences are wrong.
About fifty years ago Kurt Godel demonstrated that any axiomatic mathematical system that could prove as true all propositions known to be true would also prove as true propositions that could be shown to be false, and conversely. And that is for mathematics. Unfortunately, the implications for other fields are often ignored. As the Dutch said while fighting the Spanish: "It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."
Um, more like 80 years ago (1931), and what Gödel proved is that 1) a formal system that contains arithmetic contains true propositions unprovable within the system; 2) the consistency of such a formal system cannot be proved within the system.
I don't know that the theorem has implications for fields that don't contain arithmetic, except in lowering our expectations of consistency and completeness.
It's not about experiences being right or wrong, but about being generalisable. And you're right about the issue being one of interpretation even if there is agreement on the phenomenon. A vivid image of what should exist acts as a surrogate for reality. Pursuit of the image then prevents pursuit of the reality -- John K. Galbraith
Who's Korzybski? A vivid image of what should exist acts as a surrogate for reality. Pursuit of the image then prevents pursuit of the reality -- John K. Galbraith
I think the main implication of Incompleteness is that some truths are axiomatic and based in (horror...) subjective experience. They can't deduced because they're primary qualia.
If put two similar things next to each other, you experience the twoness of the similar things rather than eighteenness similar things. (Ceteris paribus, etc.) The experience of numberness and of basic addition and subtraction is probably innate, although some cultures develop it much farther than others, while others barely develop it at all.
Some animals can count too, after a fashion.
Subitizing, coined in 1949 by E.L. Kaufman et al.[1] refers to the rapid, accurate, and confident judgments of number performed for small numbers of items. The term is derived from the Latin adjective subitus (meaning sudden) and captures a feeling of immediately knowing how many items lie within the visual scene, when the number of items present falls within the subitizing range.[1] Number judgments for larger set-sizes were referred to either as counting or estimating, depending on the number of elements present within the display, and the time given to observers in which to respond (i.e., estimation occurs if insufficient time is available for observers to accurately count all the items present). The accuracy, speed, and confidence with which observers make judgments of the number of items are critically dependent on the number of elements to be enumerated. Judgments made for displays composed of around one to four items are rapid[2], accurate[3] and confident.[4] However, as the number of items to be enumerated increases beyond this amount, judgments are made with decreasing accuracy and confidence.[1] In addition, response times rise in a dramatic fashion, with an extra 250 ms - 350 ms added for each additional item within the display beyond about four. ... So, while there may be no span of apprehension, there appear to be real differences in the ways in which a small number of elements is processed by the visual system (i.e., approximately < 4 items), compared with larger numbers of elements (i.e., approximately > 4 items). Recent findings [7] demonstrated that subitizing and counting are not restricted to visual perception, but also extend to tactile perception (when observers had to name the number of stimulated fingertips).
The accuracy, speed, and confidence with which observers make judgments of the number of items are critically dependent on the number of elements to be enumerated. Judgments made for displays composed of around one to four items are rapid[2], accurate[3] and confident.[4] However, as the number of items to be enumerated increases beyond this amount, judgments are made with decreasing accuracy and confidence.[1] In addition, response times rise in a dramatic fashion, with an extra 250 ms - 350 ms added for each additional item within the display beyond about four.
... So, while there may be no span of apprehension, there appear to be real differences in the ways in which a small number of elements is processed by the visual system (i.e., approximately < 4 items), compared with larger numbers of elements (i.e., approximately > 4 items). Recent findings [7] demonstrated that subitizing and counting are not restricted to visual perception, but also extend to tactile perception (when observers had to name the number of stimulated fingertips).
But is this qualia? Applying sequential attention within the subitizing range doesn't lead to different results. A vivid image of what should exist acts as a surrogate for reality. Pursuit of the image then prevents pursuit of the reality -- John K. Galbraith
But is this qualia?
No.
Qualia is the mental state of "knowing what it is like" to have a particular mental state.
Axioms can't be deduced because they're axiomatic. A vivid image of what should exist acts as a surrogate for reality. Pursuit of the image then prevents pursuit of the reality -- John K. Galbraith
Also, thinking again about subitizing, it is not only repeatable but also people can agree on the result. The qualia (what it feels like to subitize four as opposed to counting to four) is irrelevant to a large extent. It's just extremely interesting that we can subitize and it may even have linguistic implications for grammatical number, but just because your native language doesn't have counting numbers doesn't mean you can't learn them, and the possible connection between perception and grammar is not so surprising since both perception and grammar involve the same brain. A vivid image of what should exist acts as a surrogate for reality. Pursuit of the image then prevents pursuit of the reality -- John K. Galbraith
I'd be surprised if basic arithmetic - certainly addition, possibly subtraction, probably not anything more advanced - wasn't similarly rooted in experience.
But the basic point was that arithmetic is rooted in experience, and doesn't exist independently of it. Trying to prove it using formal logic makes for an interesting scenic trip, but eventually you end up standing over a hole which logic can't fill for you.
Axioms - to use the term strictly - establish the Rules of the Deductive Game you're playing, intellectually speaking. Nothing prevents anyone else from declaring other axioms and playing other games. This is exactly how non-Euclidean geometries is/are developed.
Deductive Truth arises from the manipulation of the Terms and Operations, within the Axioms, of A Deductive System - as guided by the particular Interpretation of that system. Even within the good old Categorical Logic there are two Interpretations: Aristotelean and Boolean.
Verification of the results - the Truthyness of the Truth Value ;-) of a particular Axiomatic System - is a whole 'nuther topic.
Who's Korzybski?
He created General Semantics. I mentioned him several times here. "Dieu se rit des hommes qui se plaignent des conséquences alors qu'ils en chérissent les causes" Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet
I just don't like writing about myself - why should my personal experience be of interest to anyone else? It's safer to write about what can be reasonably expected to be a shared experience. I guess one of the things I'm wary of is getting feedback that my writing is narcissistic because I'd be writing about stuff which is primarily interesting because it's about me.
Interestingly, I don't think other people's personal writing is narcissistic and almost always recommend it. A vivid image of what should exist acts as a surrogate for reality. Pursuit of the image then prevents pursuit of the reality -- John K. Galbraith
I'll let others supply the name.
