In 2003, I remember studying fallacies in English class. I literally had an outbreak of laughter during an exercise where the prompt was: “vote for me or admit you’re racist”. It seemed so ridiculous to teenage me that such a thing could be said. In 2020 it has been said. I’m no longer falling out of my seat laughing.
All People in Canada are the Same Age (1997)
51–60 of 102 posts
Re: All People in Canada are the Same Age (1997)
#52Re: All People in Canada are the Same Age (1997)
#53Earlier quoted context omitted.
Right, it proves S(2)->S(3), but induction asks you to prove S(n)->S(n+1) for n in general, and not just for some n. The inductive proof doesn't work for S(1)->S(2), so it clearly can't work for the more general n->n+1.
The inductive step is fine, but it only works for n >= 2. The issue is a disconnect with the base case n = 1. However, if it were possible to prove the case n = 2, we would have a valid inductive proof for n >= 2.
Right, so it doesn't work -- either it's a correct proof of a non-sequitur ("true for n implies true for n+1, provided n meets some criteria"), or an incorrect proof of an inductive step ("true for n implies true for n+1").
Because it's claimed to be proof by induction, it's meant to be the latter -- the person doing the proving claimed to have proven the inductive step, and their proof of it was incorrect.
Re: All People in Canada are the Same Age (1997)
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
The inductive step is fine, but it only works for n >= 2. The issue is a disconnect with the base case n = 1. However, if it were possible to prove the case n = 2, we would have a valid inductive proof for n >= 2.
> it only works for n >= 2 Right, so it doesn't work -- either it's a correct proof of a non-sequitur ("true for n implies true for n+1, provided n meets some criteria"), or an incorrect proof of an inductive step ("true for n implies true for n+1"). Because it's claimed to be proof by induction, it's meant to be the latter -- the person doing the proving claimed to have proven the inductive step, and their proof of…
However, it must be coupled with a base case >= 2, which isn’t the case here. The only base case proven is 1.
See also “Induction basis other than 0 or 1” [0].
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_induction#Inducti...
Re: All People in Canada are the Same Age (1997)
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
One part of mathematics that I rather like is figuring out how to phrase a statement as precisely as possible. (For me, this is also what differentiates good philosophy from bad philosophy.) I've been struggling with the best way to interpret the 2016 election results, especially with the 2020 election coming up. The most precise way to phrase it is as follows: For each person who voted for Trump in 2016, at least on…
The primary fallacy is that racism is a Boolean value of some sort.
This also gets into the point where racism will continue to exist so long as "not racist" is seen as one end of the spectrum. Rather, in order to be appropriately egalitarian, one must be anti-racist wherever society is racist.
Re: All People in Canada are the Same Age (1997)
#56https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doomsday_argument
"In other words, we could assume that we could be 95% certain that we would be within the last 95% of all the humans ever to be born."
Re: All People in Canada are the Same Age (1997)
#57In 2003, I remember studying fallacies in English class. I literally had an outbreak of laughter during an exercise where the prompt was: “vote for me or admit you’re racist”. It seemed so ridiculous to teenage me that such a thing could be said. In 2020 it has been said. I’m no longer falling out of my seat laughing.
One part of mathematics that I rather like is figuring out how to phrase a statement as precisely as possible. (For me, this is also what differentiates good philosophy from bad philosophy.) I've been struggling with the best way to interpret the 2016 election results, especially with the 2020 election coming up. The most precise way to phrase it is as follows: For each person who voted for Trump in 2016, at least on…
There is research to indicate people respond to visual cues as an indicator of in-group/out-group tribalism, but that mental software can be overrun by observing the individual as opposed to categorizing the individual into a group. https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/look_twice This would be connected to one's communication that can be overcome.
As well as this, G. Loury describes racial stigma, which is to observe existing race gaps as a combination of past racist policies, exacerbated by present egalitarian/meritocratic policies, where the inequality is incorrectly ascribed to innate, immutable characteristics of race, rather than a consequence of an individual/hobbled community starting 50 meters behind everyone else in a 100m sprint. https://www.irp.wisc.edu/publications/focus/pdfs/foc241a.pdf This would be connected with one's worldview which can be overcome by understanding racism within history, as well as global weather distributions, and geographical resource distribution (Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond).
And I don't think I need to cite anything about racist ideas not covered by the above can be overcome by using enlightenment values and unifying messages.
I'd say trump has proclaimed some very racist ideas which run against enlightenment values and consequently are repulsive. There are obviously some percentage of followers of trump that hold worldviews that I'd find repulsive due to my alignment with enlightenment values. That doesn't mean the ideas these people hold are immutable.
Whilst my main political priority is minimising inequality at large, which in this context will disproportionately assist populations currently in poverty and resolve a lot of racial tension and racial stigma, policies that DON'T assist communities suffering from poverty should not be assumed to be racist, but rather are exacerbating gaps generated from previous racist(read discriminating by skin colour) policies. Whilst it might be unpalatable, I believe it is more realistic when you consider a large part of the American dream is about pulling yourself up from your bootstraps.
Also, Trump holds positions on economics that resonate large swathes of the American populous in communities that have been decimated by both automation, and job exportation, as pointed out by Andrew Yang. And as scarcity replaces abundance, individual's sphere of compassion shrinks. As a general example, consider who you would be considerate to if you were in an unescapable location undergoing famine.
Whilst I appreciate the desire to simplify the world around you which all humans try to do, I think to try to compress an individual's political worldview into 3 binary dimensions is dropping the majority of an individual's motivation.
I'd say that the main cause of racial gaps is historical institutional racism, that are exacerbated by today's egalitarian/meritocracy policies practices. And since the 1970s, corporate America began it's ascendance to decimate the middle class, rural America, collective bargaining, profit over economic equality, and almost completely corrupt the political system. This means to me that the biggest problem in America is political corruption and corporate power/corruption which results in increased inequality. Solve that and I think America's other problems of racial stigma, various important gaps across populations, lack of national pride, strength of democracy locally and globally, and the decreasing ability to pursue happiness in America would be much easier to solve.
This is just one Australian's opinion though. I might be wrong about the whole thing.
Re: All People in Canada are the Same Age (1997)
#58I heard this in the “All horses have the same color” version.
[1] https://www.amazon.com/Elements-Discrete-Mathematics-C-Liu/d...
Re: All People in Canada are the Same Age (1997)
#59Earlier quoted context omitted.
> it only works for n >= 2 Right, so it doesn't work -- either it's a correct proof of a non-sequitur ("true for n implies true for n+1, provided n meets some criteria"), or an incorrect proof of an inductive step ("true for n implies true for n+1"). Because it's claimed to be proof by induction, it's meant to be the latter -- the person doing the proving claimed to have proven the inductive step, and their proof of…
“True for n implies true for n+1, provided n >= 2” is a perfectly good inductive step. However, it must be coupled with a base case >= 2, which isn’t the case here. The only base case proven is 1. See also “Induction basis other than 0 or 1” [0]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_induction#Inducti...
Nobody was trying or claiming to be doing any other kind of induction. They said they had the base case and the inductive step, and they were clear about the base case and the inductive step. Their proof of the base case was correct, and their proof of the inductive step did not prove what they said it did. It doesn't matter what it did prove.
Re: All People in Canada are the Same Age (1997)
#60Fun stuff, there's a few more on this page: https://www.math.toronto.edu/mathnet/falseProofs/fallacies.h... The last one in particular I thought was interesting