Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Bullshit ≡ Dogma

Any questions?

Appendix

≡ is defined as "is another name for".


Table of logic symbols

11 comments:

Edward said...

At some point you have to have substance or you are nothing more than graffiti.

Ann R. Key said...

Ed!

I guess third time is a charm. Ü

Do you have something against graffiti as well?

"Graffiti is sometimes regarded as a form of art and other times regarded as unsightly damage or unwanted vandalism."

Remember American Graffiti? Holy long term memory! I haven't thought of that in years. I have to get that.

I presume you disagree with my latest graffiti.

No questions?

Gabo said...

Dear Ann R Key,

I think you got it reversed, and it should be Dogma SUPEREQUAL Bullshit. But what the heck, maybe since they are exactly the same the order is not important, except that the message is not exactly what you intended?

Best,
G.E.

Ann R. Key said...

Dear get_education,

I got the ≡ sign from wikipedia. Where it states that x ≡ y is stating that x is defined to be another name for y. As for it being reversed, my wife thought the same. I think that "bullshit is another name for dogma" is subtly better than "dogma is another name for bullshit", but, they both essentially say the same thing. Are you still sure its not what I intended? I'd be willing to edit if so.

Wiki doesn't appear to have SUPEREQUAL. I think I get the gist, is there a symbol for it?

Regards

Ann R. Key said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Ann R. Key said...

G.E.,

Funny the things one forgets.

Wiki also shows that ≡ means: if and only if. It can also mean (I think, per wiki): material equivalence. The first symbol for that category being: ⇔, which I considered using, but ended up using "x is another name for y".

Is this ⇔ what you meant by SUPEREQUAL?

Ann R. Key

Quantum_Flux said...

the 'triple-equal' sign means "is defined as"

Ann R. Key said...

The 'triple-equal' also means "is another name for" per my source.

Ann R. Key said...

But note that ≡ can also mean other things, such as congruence

Quantum_Flux said...

Philosophy is Bullshit

"My son is taking a course in philosophy, and last night we were looking at something by Spinoza and there was the most childish reasoning! There were all these attributes, and Substances, and all this meaningless chewing around, and we started to laugh. Now how could we do that? Here's this great Dutch philosopher, and we're laughing at him. It's because there's no excuse for it! In the same period there was Newton, there was Harvey studying the circulation of the blood, there were people with methods of analysis by which progress was being made! You can take every one of Spinoza's propositions, and take the contrary propositions, and look at the world and you can't tell which is right."

Richard P. Feynman, The Pleasure of Finding Things Out

Anonymous said...

A bit of a childish statement. What exactly is dogma, in your mind?

Everything is challenge-able, but if dogma is to hold a postulate as true without a "scientific demonstration" or proof, then certainly you are as guilty of dogma as the next person. After all, you accept (at least in theory) the validity of reason, logic, the scientific method, the senses, your own existence, etc... without requiring their justification via scientific demonstration or proof. If you deny that, then you're emotionalizing, not reasoning.

Gee, I think we have a bit of a closet dogmatist on our hands! :O