I am sick, hungover off the battle my wits have withstood with the day's latest logical conundrum. I deserve not to deserve? Nay! I deserve better!
Enter: Logical Conundrum Hotline.
99c/min and you will be connected to a host of established philosophers, directing you to the specialist in the field of your particular conundrum. At ease, cowboy, we're bringing you home. Experience the joy of settled thoughts and finished reasoning for pennies a day.-- daseva, May 09 2005 Kirby http://www.137.com/kirby/516_3.jpg [normzone, May 10 2005] kerby http://www.streetga...ames.php?article=11 [goatfaceKilla, May 10 2005] (?) Curbie http://webpages.cha...history_x_owned.jpg [AfroAssault, May 10 2005] Russell's Antimony http://mathworld.wo...ssellsAntinomy.html [Detly, May 10 2005] I wonder if they'll be able to tell me why the piña colada iced tea is red at The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf.-- Machiavelli, May 09 2005 For 99c/min I'll do this. I can't guarantee that I won't answer all questions with "It doesn't matter".-- hidden truths, May 09 2005 And why is it that if you put that milk substitute stuff (in the UK it's called 'Carnation') in coffee, and then add a marshmallow, the milkstuff curdles?-- moomintroll, May 09 2005 No whey.-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, May 09 2005 ...José.-- Machiavelli, May 09 2005 blase.-- daseva, May 09 2005 Does that make it anti-matter ?-- normzone, May 09 2005 It doesn't matter ... if you get that it doesn't matter.-- reensure, May 09 2005 It dosen't matter if it matters that it dosen't matter if it matters.-- daseva, May 10 2005 Kirby [link]-- normzone, May 10 2005 kerby [link]-- goatfaceKilla, May 10 2005 Curbie [link]-- AfroAssault, May 10 2005 "Yeah, hi, um... look, this is kind of... uh, embarassing, but, um... I was wondering... uh... if R is the set containing all sets not containing themselves, does R contain itself?
"... Hello? Hello?
"[sigh]"-- Detly, May 10 2005 If you get one of these self-referential, paradoxical things going on, just remind yourself that there's something wrong with the question.
To find the answer you must transcend the bounds of the question and consider what assumptions or implicit axioms are in place. Somewhere, there will be some chink that allows you to come to a rational end-point.
Spiralling down recursive logic is fun once, but soon turns into an unpleasant experience, especially if it's about something that's important to you.
In the answer to [Bubs]'s man, I'd suggest that while the man often lies, he also occasionally tells the truth. His tendency for grandiose over-generalisations is probably due to some childhood trauma revolving around his mother. But that's by the by.
As for deserving not to deserve? Fuck knows.-- zen_tom, May 10 2005 <phoneworkers on strike>"We demand rigidly defined areas of doubt and uncertainty!"-- RayfordSteele, May 10 2005 // In the answer to [Bubs]'s man, I'd suggest that while the man often lies, he also occasionally tells the truth. His tendency for grandiose over-generalisations is probably due to some childhood trauma revolving around his mother. But that's by the by.//
That is a good point, zen_tom. If it is known that one always lies, then in a sense one always tells the truth.
Perhaps he attempts instead to maximise the surprisal of his answers.-- Loris, May 10 2005 Dammit. I hate that I like this idea.-- Soterios, May 10 2005 Music to my ears...
if R contains itself then it cannot be in R. If R does not contain itself then it must be in R.
Your set specifications are too broad. The definition requires an infinite set space, and, as such, cannot be refined by any means of logic. That is, the number of sets not containing themselves is too large to be handled withing the boundaries of hehe... I talk nothing.
There is no spoon.-- daseva, May 10 2005 "There's never a spoon when you want one, and there's always a spoon when you need to stop bullets with your mind."-- zen_tom, May 10 2005 Suppose the man only lies once in a while, and in saying that he lies all the time, he was telling a lie. Maybe he is only capable of lying once in his entire life, and it was spent telling everyone that he lies constantly, and from this point on he is only capable of telling the truth, which will be perceived as lies because of his single lie.-- AfroAssault, May 10 2005 Well if you can only do it once, best make it a doozy.-- Soterios, May 10 2005 It`s easy to say a thing with language that is either non-verifiable or nonsense. you fuckers.-- goatfaceKilla, May 10 2005 yeah, in general, you can define something as undefineable, and then you've shot yourself in the metaphorical foot. There must be a seperation of realms: that which is defineable, and that which is not. But, Like the set R of all sets not including themselves, you cannot define something in relation to itself or as an assembly of objects in relation to themselves. just can't do it. Mother won't allow it.
So, a few rules of thumb. Don't define something as undefineable, and don't define anything in relation to itself, and you should be home free.-- daseva, May 10 2005 Are you lot playing with language or logic?-- wagster, May 10 2005 yeah, little bit of both...
of course, your question qualifies for the helpline...-- daseva, May 10 2005 No, curved ones.-- wagster, May 10 2005 Not to mention that it is anæthema to the voices ... mmm, they're certainly getting louder now.-- reensure, May 10 2005 How do you do that ae bunched together thing?-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, May 10 2005 "Fear leads to anger; anger leads to hate; hate leads to suffering." -- Yoda
Sorry, couldn't resist.
I know the egg one: put a little pile of salt under the tablecloth before the guests arrive, and, with the proper patter and flourish, place the egg vertically, nestled in the salt, hidden by the cloth. Fun at parties!-- Soterios, May 11 2005 The idea of a set containing itself or not is perfectly well defined. For example, the set of all egg-cups does not contain itself, but the set of all things that are not egg-cups does contain itself.
Russell's antimony can be resolved by a reworking of the axioms of set theory - specifically, requiring that all elements of the domain of a function be defined before defining the function. This is not possible with the function P(x) = [is x <- x?].-- Detly, May 11 2005 Somewhere different to where we wouldn`t be with rhetorical answers.-- goatfaceKilla, May 12 2005 Oh, well now you've gone and ruined it. Nothing left to do but eat our own tongues.-- AfroAssault, May 12 2005 Bite it off first, or you might choke.-- goatfaceKilla, May 12 2005 At this juncture, it becomes necessary to quote the Sacred Chao: "Mu."-- Soterios, May 12 2005 Not that it matters, but this would make me madder than massless matter.-- sophocles, May 12 2005 Oh, and all mysteries & paradoxes are only interesting if you TRY to understand them. If you're dialing the #, you're already expecting utter nonsense or paradox, and so you would be unlikely to "try", and thus disengage and have no fun. Kind of like you do when you get 1/2 through the annos here.-- sophocles, May 12 2005 Hmm... that is definitly an avenue of occurance, many people will call the line only to find they are ill-equipped for such discourse.
Other avenues are thus,
Prank callers. We wait patiently for them.
Students and associate professors of philosophy.
Stoners and acid heads.
Children who hate the answer: "because", and who have access to mommy's credit card, and who have a sufficiently deceptive voice to allow for legal clerance.-- daseva, May 12 2005 Mother nature chuckles at her beautiful lost children-- bardvark, May 13 2005 O, so *that's* where all that chuckling comes from.-- Soterios, May 13 2005 this was baked at one point on an official movie web-site. think it was "AI". don't know if it's still there, but they had a bot that liked to chat, and he gave answers using keywords. the answers had perfect coherence and only related to what i said. i think no answering person can do better than that, and that was free of charge.-- sweet, May 25 2005 Very cool idea. I think that they would soon grow to hate me...
I am reminded of a sketch on some BBC Radio 4 comedy program in which they call up the milk helpline to find out what it is they actually help with.-- dbmag9, Feb 07 2006 Let us not ignore the possibility of Heisenberg's answering the line. Actually, I would like asking him if he's sure about what he said.-- sweet, Mar 25 2007 Funny, I was reminded of the great sketch argument, by John Cleese and those goofey Monty Python fellows. "I Paid for an argument." "No you didn't" "Yes I did" "No you didn't" "This isn't an argument this is just direct contradiction." "Not it isn't"
Explain the thing about the egg and the salt at a dinner party to me again? I think I've missed something.
Change the name, before I give you a muffin.-- ColonelMuffins, Mar 25 2007 1/2 bun for the idea, and 1/2 bun for the comments (share that half among yourselves, everyone).-- discontinuuity, Mar 25 2007 // "Yesterday I met a man who told me he always lies. Should I believe him?"//
That's not a paradox. You shouldnt believe him, because it's impossible for him to be telling the truth, but that doesn't mean he ALWAYS lies, just this time.
As for the idea, whoever wrote it has clearly not taken many philosophy classes. "settled thoughts" and "finished reasoning" are oxymorons in philosophy.
//Russell's antimony can be resolved by a reworking of the axioms of set theory - specifically, requiring that all elements of the domain of a function be defined before defining the function. //
I kindly request that you list all elements of the set "chairs," such that exactly all chairs match.-- Smurfsahoy, Mar 26 2007 'n since when is a lot of philosophy classes experience a prerequisite for posting an idea on ye old bakery?-- sweet, Mar 26 2007 sweet, sweet.
(wait for it...)
AHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!-- daseva, Mar 26 2007 oh oh I've got it!-- sweet, Mar 26 2007 //It doesn't matter.//
I didn't know so many of you were Galavantalised Inconsequentialists! How goes it fellow brethren?-- theleopard, Mar 25 2008 deseva if you are out there, I have a skype account, and the title to this shows up on my screen as a link. Jutta had to explain to me how to get in here. Anyway, hello, I have nothing to contribute. But just so you know, the phone number doesn't work.-- dentworth, Mar 26 2008 I think I found something like this the other day... there's a post on Craigslist titled "Problems Solved." It doesn't specify what kind of problems or how or even if they can solve them, but it says to give them a try. So far I haven't come up with an interesting enough problem to try them out, but it sounded interesting.-- Alterother, Mar 26 2008 In the last hour I have found out I can disable the phone # link to my skype. Right click on the skype icon, disable highlighting.-- dentworth, Mar 26 2008 I just had to remove Skype from my computer to be able to open this idea.-- normzone, Mar 26 2008 That's really awful. Does anyone know the software details of this "feature"? [Update: Looks like text that looks like a phone number gets annotated by a skype plugin to activate the phone software when it's clicked on. Which is fine, except when clicking on the phone number is already supposed to do something else, i.e. open a webpage!]-- jutta, Mar 26 2008 wow, I can open this now without devious measures...-- po, Mar 26 2008 How cool that this idea put skype in a conundrum. Silly computers can't cope.-- daseva, Mar 27 2008 norm, I searched for the idea in google and opened it thus.-- po, Mar 27 2008 I feel like I'm home, at last... :-)-- Iidhaegn, Mar 27 2008 Welcome home, [Iidhaegn].-- pertinax, Mar 27 2008 \\I didn't know so many of you were Galavantalised Inconsequentialists! How goes it fellow brethren?\\ Meh.-- hidden truths, Mar 29 2008 This one got hit a few months ago. For no good reason, btw.-- daseva, Dec 30 2008 Ah, this makes me yearn for those bygone days when "Not enough information to answer the question" was an acceptable answer.-- Spacecoyote, Dec 30 2008 Shouldn't this be 1-900-MINDFUK (646-3385), as 1-800 numbers are reserved for toll-free?-- Alx_xlA, Aug 29 2010 Precisely. It's a 1-800 number, but you still get charged.
Very Zen.-- 8th of 7, Aug 29 2010 random, halfbakery