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This Message Does Not Exist

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Re: This Message Does Not Exist

#121

Post by khendron »

lisper wrote: post #85

Everyone is snickering at this and talking about philosophy, but there is actually a legitimate point being made here, albeit obliquely: how do you explain to a non-technical user that their data has been deleted on the server, but that their client still has a cached copy that they might want to try to salvage somehow? I submit that this is a nontrivial problem worthy of serious consideration.

You don't. Explaining what happened is not going to help the user at all. You can only explain what options are available to the user. Something like the following

"Sorry, this message can no longer be saved. Copy this message before discarding it if you will need access to it later."

Re: This Message Does Not Exist

#122

Post by [deleted] »

Wolfenstein98k wrote: post #79
sherburt3 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think the model is that far off. In real life I can read a letter and retain the contents in my mind, then burn the letter.

But this is claiming that the letter does not exist, while allowing you to read the contents of the letter. If it can show you the content, the container must exist!

[deleted]

Re: This Message Does Not Exist

#124

Post by shnock »

rovr138 wrote: post #101
femto wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A typical person's head will explode at the mention of the words "cache" and "server". They will then go into a blind panic that their data is going to be "permanently deleted".

"locally", "the cloud"

Even that can still be too far. I lean towards “your computer” and “their computer”

Re: This Message Does Not Exist

#126

Post by vince3455 »

Wolfenstein98k wrote: post #79
sherburt3 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think the model is that far off. In real life I can read a letter and retain the contents in my mind, then burn the letter.

But this is claiming that the letter does not exist, while allowing you to read the contents of the letter. If it can show you the content, the container must exist!

In a post office, open a letter, burn the envelope. The content now exists, but the message does not.

Re: This Message Does Not Exist

#129

Post by Sebb767 »

m463 wrote: post #61
cortesoft wrote: post #36

Oh, finally a chance to put my Philosophy degree to use! The error says the "message" does not exist, but the message is not the same as the text. The message is an object that can be saved or discarded, and it contains text. The text still exists and can be copied, but the message is gone and can't be saved anymore.

if the message never achieved a physical form such as printing, does the message exist? if the message stopped existing, but nobody was there, did it make the trash-can sound?

> if the message never achieved a physical form such as printing, does the message exist?

The physical bits do exist, though, on the storage medium. Now, of course this does not match our usual image of existing, since the bytes were technically always there, but it still exists in the physical world.

You can actually make the same argument with a letter: The paper and ink were there before, the pattern ist what brought it to existence.

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