Skepticism and The Normal

Mojo said:
Vauxhall

BTW, well done, Taffer. I really hadn't spotted that one!
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Thank you, Mojo, it was a high risk maneuver that paid off in the end. Of course, now, to keep me in the running on the score board, I need to finish at least above the Second Half Margin, else I'm going to get a regression penalty (and you're right, at least I'm not in full regression, or I'd have to make at least the Turning Station before anyone else dropped Spoon into wild or face a Retribution Round.

That, and I have to open last.
 
We're not "reactors," and we're not trying to find things to disprove "OS 012." On the contrary, we (most of us, anyway) see problems with "OS 012," and we feel compelled to point out the problems so that you have constructive feedback to either refine the idea, or so that you know to abandon it in favor of other ideas that might work better. If I'm wrong about this, then somebody call me on it, but that's certainly been my motivation.
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Indeed, you're correct on all of that Wayne. As I've said before OS012 does sound like a nice idea, but so far it's a bit of a non-starter.

Wayne, just for your benefit since you have hit the ground running on this one, just in case you haven't had a chance to read back through the whole thread. One serious problem is that nobody knows exactly what OS012 is; those "laws" appear to be a starting point, but if you read the homepage not very much is actually said besides how great it is. Strangely Bubb has a tendency to use the resulting lack of understanding as an argument: his response to many rebuttals is along the lines of "you don't understand it yet, you're arguing with a poor interpretation of OS012 rather than the real thing." Strangely this is never accompanied by any attempt at clarification.

The closest that I have come to describing OS012 in a way that Bubb doesn't immediately reject is along the lines of: "a dialectic which logically proves whether statements made by parties within a discussion are objective, subjective or unknowable." Potentially this is quite a nice idea, if you could prove that what somebody thinks they know they only actually believe then resolutions of discussions could be made on the basis of fact to mutual benefit. Sadly there appear to be some fatal flaws:

1. It's not intuitive and possibly even illogical (this may be down to Bubb's unusual use of language).

2. Since Bubb appears to define objective roughly as "true" it requires the separation of true statements from subjective statements (which requires evidence and research) rather than the separation of objective and subjective statements (which can be done reasonably intuitively - Prof. Yaffle's example aside). So we'd still have to fall back on research to confirm our facts, just like we do now.

3. There has been no convincing explanation of how OS012 will be effective in the case of people who simply refuse to use or engage with it. Choosing to use it would apparently leave you open to having your most strongly held beliefs proved to simply be opinions. So the cases where a conflict resolution technique might be most useful (e.g., fundamentalist conflicts) are exactly where it is likely to be rejected. Bubb has mentioned something about "advancing truths" and "people's irrationality becoming clear within the tit-for-tat". I have no idea what the former means beyond the example of this and other threads (i.e., keeping on posting until other people get bored/offended and leave, and then claiming victory for yourself). I think the latter ignores the fact that many people move mainly in circles (e.g., creationist) where even the most indefensible views are not seen as irrational so peer ridicule will not necessarily be present.

The real problems:

4. There has been no detail on how it works. Bubb has claimed that this is for copyright protection etc. But he has provided no hints on how the required logical proofs might be reached or a discussion forwarded using OS012. This detail was requested back on badscience.net a few months ago and still no detail has been forthcoming.

5. There is no evidence that it works... at all. Bubb has cited a case to do with online music sharing but again has pleaded confidentiality requirements of one form or another.
 
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I have been looking up some philosophy websites, and some of the mentioned that statements like "I like jam" are considered subjective, whereas we have been talking about them as objective expressions of a subjective idea (jam is nice). Anyone want to dive in about that? I can provide links if people want me to.
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Can I give a trivial answer? That statement "I like jam" is subjective as it stands simply because it uses "I" and therefore when used in that exact form the truth value does depend on who is saying it. However, if the subject is disambiguated "flimflam likes jam" it is objective because it refers to the (measurable) preferences of a specific individual rather than the ever-shifting "I". Also talking about yourself in the 3rd person makes you sound cool!

Oh, and since my blocking manouevre of Marylebone didn't stop Taffer from completing his side-force shut-out I shall have to up the ante and block all diagonals by calling King's Cross (with the optional St. Pancras inversion).

I take it we are playing for minor honours now that Taffer has won. I'm happy to start a new round if people would prefer.
 
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flimflam_machine said:
Can I give a trivial answer? That statement "I like jam" is subjective as it stands simply because it uses "I" and therefore when used in that exact form the truth value does depend on who is saying it. However, if the subject is disambiguated "I [flimflam] like jam" it is objective because it refers to the (measurable) preferences of a specific individual rather than the ever-shifting "I".
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I think the point was more that subjective statements or ideas are those which depend on there being a person experiencing them in order for the to exist. An objective statement is a statement about something that exists out there in the world, and it exists regardless of there being a person experiencing it. So with this reasoning, "flim-flam likes jam" would be subjective too.

And then you get into the whole area that comes up in the article I linked to: "Orange juice tastes better than milk" is subjective, but what about "Orange juice tastes better than excrement"? Because everyone agrees with the second statement, does that make it objective, or is it still subjective because it, like the first statement, relies on someone experiencing taste.
 
An objective statement is a statement about something that exists out there in the world, and it exists regardless of there being a person experiencing it. So with this reasoning, "flim-flam likes jam" would be subjective too.
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Fair argument, this is quite a can of worms we've opened here. I think that "flimflam likes jam" could be tested objectively but only to an imperfect level of proof. You could cite examples of my membership of the jam-of-the-month club, the fact that I eat jam every morning for breakfast and that completely unsubstantiated rumour about me, Uma Thurman and the economy-size jar of seedless raspberry. However none of this would conclusively prove that I like jam and it could all be a cunning scheme to disguise the fact that I, in fact, despise jam. You could scan my brain as I eat jam and show that my pleasure centres are highly active but that still doesn't prove that I am experiencing subjective pleasure. And, as you point out, "liking" anything depends completely on there being a subject present to "like" the object.

Which sort of leads onto another consequence of this approach. For most things that we perceive there is a physical property that corresponds to the phenomenological experience. So when we perceive a change in colour, what is actually changing is wavelength, when we perceive loudness what is actually there is amplitude. Since the phenomenological aspect is dependent on there being an observer present you could argue that a statements objective/subjective statement depends on the precise term used. Therefore "London buses are red" could be subjective, not because we don't have a solid, objective definition of "red" but because "red" is actually the phenomenological correlate of light around 650nm. For "red" to exist requires an observer who would be undergoing a process some have called "redding" (imaginatively enough). The statement "London buses' greatest light reflectance is for wavelengths > 650nm" would be completely objective. This is really splitting hairs now!

Are you waiting for the start of the next round now? I have a cunning plan waiting for that shocking East-quarter weakness you always have from injudicious use of the Winfield opening!

And then you get into the whole area that comes up in the article I linked to: "Orange juice tastes better than milk" is subjective, but what about "Orange juice tastes better than excrement"? Because everyone agrees with the second statement, does that make it objective, or is it still subjective because it, like the first statement, relies on someone experiencing taste.
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Still subjective I reckon, and the bit in that article about relevant expertise is tosh. She's basically saying that one person's experience is more correct than another's. Baffling.

Nice summary of Bubb's confusion though:

A claim is epistemologically objective if there are generally recognized methods for deciding whether the claim is true or false. For example, the claim "There are 45 desks in this room" is epistemologically objective. Note that "objective" now does not mean the same as "true," since the claim "There are 45 desks in this room" is objective whether or not it is true or false. "Objectivity," properly understood, presupposes the availability of a method for producing agreement among people.
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Professor Yaffle said:
I think the point was more that subjective statements or ideas are those which depend on there being a person experiencing them in order for the to exist. An objective statement is a statement about something that exists out there in the world, and it exists regardless of there being a person experiencing it. So with this reasoning, "flim-flam likes jam" would be subjective too.

And then you get into the whole area that comes up in the article I linked to: "Orange juice tastes better than milk" is subjective, but what about "Orange juice tastes better than excrement"? Because everyone agrees with the second statement, does that make it objective, or is it still subjective because it, like the first statement, relies on someone experiencing taste.
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I think it's still a subjective concept. It ultimately relies on an experience that is wholly internal. Although more people might happen to agree with the statement, it's still subjective. Subjective doesn't necessarily imply "only true for you" or anything, it just implies that the critical element of the statement is an internal one.

A statement like "Most people prefer orange juice to excrement" could be externally quantified, and hence appears to be objective... provided you adequately define "most". :)

I think the whole "I like x" thing can be something of a sticky wicket. But, like I said before, I can see where it's coming from.
 
New round, new challenges. I submit:

Rickmansworth

(I know its early, but it was allowed after the 2003 Stockport-Buxton face off round.)
 
I think the problem comes down to the fact that words, as they are used often seem to refer to more than one different concept. These concepts usually correlate in the real world, so normally we don't notice this, but when we deliberately devise situations in which they diverge, we can see the inconsistency of the language. For example we consider objective to mean something pertaining to the outside world that does not require that a person is experiencing it. We also consider objective to refer to things that are directly verifiable or testable. In the real world, these things are usually the same things, but we get confused by things like colour in which features of the outside world correlate perfectly with neurological measures and with our reports of a subjective experience.

I too was thinking about the issue of colour. And when you think about it, although "red" requires a person to experience it, we can only know that redness correlates to wavelengths of light, but may have absolutely no correlation to our subjective experience of redness. My red experience could be entirely different to how you experience it. But when we all use the word red, we do know that it refers to the same thing "out there".

And lets not even get into illusions like the one where you see grey dots at the intersections of white lines etc. We all experience it, it has neurological correlates, but it doesn't exist "out there", except as a situation that creates the illusion.

Enough of this stream of consciousness, lets get back to the serious matter at hand.

I'm going to make a defensive move and use the Zammo Gambit to play:

Grange Hill
 
I think I just might join... been reading a bit, you know, for the sake of cultural diversity.

Knightsbridge
 
Professor Yaffle said:
I too was thinking about the issue of colour. And when you think about it, although "red" requires a person to experience it, we can only know that redness correlates to wavelengths of light, but may have absolutely no correlation to our subjective experience of redness. My red experience could be entirely different to how you experience it. But when we all use the word red, we do know that it refers to the same thing "out there".
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That's an interesting perspective, but it might be getting a tad metaphysical. I think that concepts like color closely correspond with things we can measure. For example, we have instruments that can measure colors, and we can determine how color is perceived in physical terms, as well as indentify those who cannot perceive it. There are differences in how individuals see colors, I'm sure (due to differences in visual accuity if nothing else), but the basic idea of color is rooted in something externally measurable, as you noted.

So, in the end, it doesn't really matter because we've chosen to define "red" in a particular way, and that way doesn't depend on the subject anymore. As you said, we can measure the wavelengths. Perhaps the subjective experience is totally different for different individuals, but it doesn't really matter.

Anyhow, back to the silliness at hand. You guys play a good game, famously entertaining to watch and all. :)
 
sinnikal said:
In that case the only move open to me is
Sun Hill.
As apparently Barton Street is to be closed
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I call for the adjudicator. Did the 2002 treaty (clause 221b) explicitly forbid a move onto the fiction board in these circumstances, or is it open to interpretation?
 
Fair points Jonny, I acknowlegde that I was wilfully descending into hair splitting territory with the colour vs. wavelength issue.

Prof. Yaffle, I shall look forward eagerly to a ruling on that since it will, of course, also indicate whether I can make a lateral-reverse onto Le Metropolitain (the Dubois jump) and so come in to block you at Liverpool Street by way of Gare du Nord.
 
Professor Yaffle said:
I call for the adjudicator. Did the 2002 treaty (clause 221b) explicitly forbid a move onto the fiction board in these circumstances, or is it open to interpretation?
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I have some serious doubts as to the objectivity of the adjudicator. I understand there is an imminent meeting of the committee at the Jasmine Allen. Can we defer a decision until the outcome is known?
 
Oh surely not that much work Bubb...

All you have to type is "Goodness me, I was wrong! I'll get right onto adjusting OS012 straight away, and I'll be back in a jiff with full details of the new and improved version including a fully worked example."

Go onnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn!
 
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