![[dr. bob]](/dr-bob-sm.gif)
Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 45 to 69 of 69. Go back in thread:
Posted by Larry Hoover on December 3, 2005, at 22:17:18
In reply to ...I should've added... » Larry Hoover, posted by pseudoname on December 3, 2005, at 16:40:29
> I forgot to add (to my preceding post about averages) that Larry's statement...
>
> > And 50% of pharmacists graduated in the bottom half of their class.
>
> ...is, I think, always true, since it refers to a percentile, not an average.It is always true because 50% is a half, of anything.
The 50th percentile is the median, so that's also another way of saying the same thing.
Lar
Posted by alexandra_k on December 3, 2005, at 22:17:49
In reply to Re: What did I do wrong?, posted by alexandra_k on December 3, 2005, at 22:06:54
oh.
and i enjoyed your posts
and your sense of humour.
had to think about the math ;-)
Posted by alexandra_k on December 3, 2005, at 22:21:09
In reply to Re: ...I should've added... » pseudoname, posted by Larry Hoover on December 3, 2005, at 22:17:18
ew.
and i was contemplating enrolling in stats 101 over summer school to try and get over my phobia of numbers...letters are okay...
but numbers are funny.
is number dyslexia a disorder - anyone?
i'm serious...
i think i have issues reading and transcribing numbers...
3's become 8's
and 6's become 5's etc
even when it's typed
and so i put them into my calculator all wrong
:-(
and get a novel answer everytime i do an equation :-(
Posted by Gabbix2 on December 3, 2005, at 22:43:20
In reply to What did I do wrong? » Gabbix2, posted by pseudoname on December 3, 2005, at 22:01:27
Oh Absolutely nothing!
Alexandra was absolutely right, I wasn't sure that your post meant that you knew Cam was being tongue in cheek that's all. It's so difficult to read intonation into plain type.
I'm really sorry that I made you feel bad
There was no need for you to apologize at all((Pseudoname))
Posted by Gabbix2 on December 3, 2005, at 22:45:04
In reply to Re: What did I do wrong?, posted by alexandra_k on December 3, 2005, at 22:06:54
I really appreciated that, you were exactly right and I'm glad you said something, I felt awful that my post came across that way and I too am glad that Pseudoname didn't have to feel bad any longer than necessary
Posted by Phillipa on December 3, 2005, at 23:15:32
In reply to Re: ...or overgeneralizing? » badhaircut, posted by Larry Hoover on December 1, 2005, at 13:08:02
Wow this Thread is going on and on. The answer to me is that you need to know all about the meds you are taking. Ask questions both to the pdoc and pharmacist. And based on your reaction to them. Call pdoc and say what they are. It is ultimately your decision whether to take them or not. And not everyone responds to meds or even responds the same way. We are all individuals. Fondly, Phillipa
Posted by Larry Hoover on December 4, 2005, at 0:26:40
In reply to Re: What did I do wrong? » alexandra_k, posted by alexandra_k on December 3, 2005, at 22:17:49
> oh.
> and i enjoyed your posts
> and your sense of humour.
> had to think about the math ;-)I like that little trick, alex, posting complements to yourself. Sly girl, you. ;-)
Posted by Larry Hoover on December 4, 2005, at 0:40:37
In reply to Re: ...I should've added..., posted by alexandra_k on December 3, 2005, at 22:21:09
> ew.
> and i was contemplating enrolling in stats 101 over summer school to try and get over my phobia of numbers...And, perhaps to get a grounding in population study, and the individual. Very useful.
> letters are okay...
>
> but numbers are funny.
>
> is number dyslexia a disorder - anyone?Dyscalculia. Hundreds of thousands of hits on Google. Lots of stuff about how to manage/cope.
> i'm serious...So am I.
> i think i have issues reading and transcribing numbers...
>
> 3's become 8's
> and 6's become 5's etc
> even when it's typed
> and so i put them into my calculator all wrong
> :-(
> and get a novel answer everytime i do an equation :-(Ya, that's what would happen. And that's an example I could have seen, straight from the first website I looked at. "Students with dyscalculia have a very difficult time visualizing numbers and often mentally mix up the numbers, resulting in what appear to be 'stupid mistakes.'"
When you're less busy, we can talk about it, if you'd like.
Lar
Posted by verne on December 4, 2005, at 8:47:21
In reply to Re: ...I should've added... » alexandra_k, posted by Larry Hoover on December 4, 2005, at 0:40:37
Could anyone recommend a good introductory logic book? Something between a textbook and Logic for Dummies. Not too many funny mathematical symbols please.
I've been doing logic puzzles since I was a kid - think I inherited it from my mom. (I like Dell logic puzzles - not the computer company) But I get lost in the more complicated puzzles that ask me to figure out how my third cousin is also my aunt, grandmother, and identical twin. (and Sweden wasn't involved)
I dropped out of a logic class in college because it looked too much like math. I wanted a fuzzy philosophy course where I could BS my way through - Logic 101 wasn't the answer.
Verne
Posted by alexandra_k on December 4, 2005, at 14:53:35
In reply to Re: ...addendum » linkadge, posted by alexandra_k on December 2, 2005, at 22:10:28
Ooh. I woke up at three in the morning...
With the realisation that I messed this up rather...> 'the present king of france is bald'.
> It is not T, so it must be F.
> but to say it is F is to imply / logically entail that
> 'there is a present king of france and that present king of france is bald' is T.LOL!!! No it isn't. to say that it is F is to imply / logically entail that 'there is a present king of france and that present king of france is bald' is F.
(oops)
So...
> but of course 'there is a present king of france' is F.Yep.
> and thus 'there is a present king of france and that king of france is bald' is F.
Yep.
But there isn't a contradiction anymore...
:-(
Crap.
I'm sure it was neither true nor false because it led to contradiction if we regarded it as false...
Zeugma...
help...
Posted by alexandra_k on December 4, 2005, at 14:59:50
In reply to Re: ...I should've added... » alexandra_k, posted by Larry Hoover on December 4, 2005, at 0:40:37
> And, perhaps to get a grounding in population study, and the individual. Very useful.
ya.
i was impressed with the text book. about the first sentance was: 'statistics is not math. it is a set of procedures for (i forget)'. that helped :-) but no. there are still numbers in it :-(
> > letters are okay...
> > but numbers are funny.
> > is number dyslexia a disorder - anyone?
> Dyscalculia. Hundreds of thousands of hits on Google. Lots of stuff about how to manage/cope.ooh.
can you get a math transcriber like you can get a reader / writer for arts and soc. sci courses?
> > i'm serious...
> So am I.hmm.
> > i think i have issues reading and transcribing numbers...> > 3's become 8's
> > and 6's become 5's etc
> > even when it's typed
> > and so i put them into my calculator all wrong
> > :-(
> > and get a novel answer everytime i do an equation :-(> Ya, that's what would happen. And that's an example I could have seen, straight from the first website I looked at. "Students with dyscalculia have a very difficult time visualizing numbers and often mentally mix up the numbers, resulting in what appear to be 'stupid mistakes.'"
ah. yes, thats me. full of 'stupid mistakes'. and... i never learned the stuff you needed to learn by rote (so no calculation is involved) - like my times tables. and like adding single numbers together. so that means... i need to calculate everything (in my head or with a calculator). but i do the same thing with them in my head as i do with them trying to key them into the calculator. and reading them too... doing check sums (of peoples marks through the course) was a bit tricky for me... i managed to do it :-) but had to try it 5 or 6 times to get three consistent answers...
(never had a complaint about that i should say - and i'd match it to what the secretary got)
> When you're less busy, we can talk about it, if you'd like.yeah. that'd be cool
:-)
Posted by alexandra_k on December 4, 2005, at 15:15:17
In reply to Logic, posted by verne on December 4, 2005, at 8:47:21
> Could anyone recommend a good introductory logic book? Something between a textbook and Logic for Dummies. Not too many funny mathematical symbols please.
hmm. this is a text book...
but the first half is in English (no symbols) and deals with puzzles / problems in English. There are LOTS of puzzles / problems and every 5th answer is provided in the back of the book.The second half deals with LPC (lower predicate calculus) and HPC (higher predicate calculus). The symbols might seem a little tricky at first... But there comes a point where it is actually easier to deal with the symbols than it is to try and tackle the problems in English. Also... English is ambiguous (with respect to how one is supposed to translate it into LPC / HPC) while the logical languages are 100% clear and precise.
In first year logic... We worked from chapter 7 on. The logical languages. Before school started I started working through the first half of the book though. Because they said 'no particular mathematical aptitude' was required and I was worried I would bomb. I actually enjoyed the first half. Mostly... The text doesn't make a lot of sense... But you kind of read it half heartedly then have a go at the problems. Only use the text insofar as it helps you understand how to do the problems...
Otherwise...
Maybe you are more interested in critical reasoning? That deals with English rather than logical languages. I should really put in the plug for this bookThe second edition is coming out soon... Though to be fair there are millions of these on the market. I have to say... IMO critical reasoning is more frustrating than logic because there are ambiguities with respect to how you 'read' (translate / interpret) the argument / problem. So... Sometimes there is no right answer. It is more about the REASONS for your answer. Logic has a right answer, though...
> I dropped out of a logic class in college because it looked too much like math.
Yeah, I sympathise...
(If it is any consolation math can actually be REDUCED to logic (I think) so long as set theory / venn diagrams are allowed as a bridge)
So... You can draw problems as sets and sets within sets. I wanted to do that with the all / most / some / one thing... But you can't draw circles in these txt boxes...> I wanted a fuzzy philosophy course where I could BS my way through - Logic 101 wasn't the answer.
Ah. I haven't encountered a 'fuzzy philosophy course where I could BS my way through' yet ;-)
Posted by CamW on December 4, 2005, at 18:02:20
In reply to Re: Looking at it another way.... » CamW, posted by Larry Hoover on December 3, 2005, at 13:25:36
Lar - ... and the psychiatrist who graduates at the bottom of his class is still call "Doctor" [shiver].
Naw, I won't be coming to the Babble Reunion; it's too far away and I am using up my Air Miles accompanying my daughter to curling bonspiels. Besides, I think I've burned way to many bridges here, over the years [sigh].
Nice to hear from you Lar - Cam
Posted by alexandra_k on December 4, 2005, at 18:09:27
In reply to Re: What did I do wrong? » alexandra_k, posted by Larry Hoover on December 4, 2005, at 0:26:40
> I like that little trick, alex, posting complements to yourself. Sly girl, you. ;-)LOL!
I just got that...
I wasn't sure what you were on about...It was for pseudoname...
Posted by linkadge on December 4, 2005, at 18:49:10
In reply to Re: ...I should've added... » pseudoname, posted by Larry Hoover on December 3, 2005, at 22:17:18
If you had a class of 4.
3 of which achieved 100%
and the 4th achieving 0%,Which two of the four would be in the bottom half of the class ?
Linkadge
Posted by zeugma on December 6, 2005, at 20:03:46
In reply to Re: ...I should've added..., posted by alexandra_k on December 3, 2005, at 22:21:09
> ew.
> and i was contemplating enrolling in stats 101 over summer school to try and get over my phobia of numbers...
>
> letters are okay...
>
> but numbers are funny.
>
> is number dyslexia a disorder - anyone?
>
yes. i have number dyslexia. i also have problems with letters- but context helps.
> i'm serious...
>
i can't do a proof, cause i always get noncommutaive operations wrong. as a matter of fact polish logic works best for me- no parentheses, just a simple left-to right iteration thus:Kab= conjunction of a and b
KNab= conjunction of not-a, and b
KNaNb= conjunction of not-a and not-b
Cab= if a, then b
CNab= if not-a, then b
KCNabc= conjunction of if not-a, then b, and c
and so on, it iterates. far more perspicuous to my parentheses-phobic (nut only in logic) and dyslexic mind.what i like about it is that it shows how any places each operator uses.
> i think i have issues reading and transcribing numbers...
>
> 3's become 8's
> and 6's become 5's etc
> even when it's typed
> and so i put them into my calculator all wrong
> :-(
> and get a novel answer everytime i do an equation :-(>>my ambitions to be a scientist were scotched in boyhood by far too many novel answers.
-z
Posted by zeugma on December 6, 2005, at 21:03:36
In reply to Re: Zeugma help!!!!!, posted by alexandra_k on December 4, 2005, at 14:53:35
> Ooh. I woke up at three in the morning...
> With the realisation that I messed this up rather...
>
> > 'the present king of france is bald'.
> > It is not T, so it must be F.
> > but to say it is F is to imply / logically entail that
> > 'there is a present king of france and that present king of france is bald' is T.
>
> LOL!!! No it isn't. to say that it is F is to imply / logically entail that 'there is a present king of france and that present king of france is bald' is F.>>it doesn't entail all that. to say that 'Z is bald' is F entails nothing about my quantificational status (although it may be very wishful thinking). 'the present king of france' is a possible existent and so contributes to the meaning of the whole (or so i would want to say to protect my precious principle of compositionality) but cannot be assigned to the extension of the predicate 'is bald,' because no tally of bald objects picks him out.
in fact there is no list that he appears on. what are we to make of him then? kaplan said that descriptions are always 'searching, searching, searching.' we are to imagine the description as a kind of identifiability rule, which we can use to range over all the objects in the universe. if it comes up empty as in the case of the present king of france, at least we knew where to look.
(this is more poetry than logic)
>> (oops)
>
> So...
>
> > but of course 'there is a present king of france' is F.
>
> Yep.
>
sentences with quantifiers are tricky.'there i am, in front of the computer' is T.
but i'd want to say that this conveys virtually no information without context.
'there are two planets inside the earth's orbit' is T thanks to the existence of Mercury and venus, and the fact that both can be paired with the concept 'planet inside the earth's orbit.'
'there is no present king of france' is T because nothing can be paired with the concept 'present king of france.'
i am assuming that existential statements involve pairings of objects with concepts, while descriptions do not. 'the second planet from the sun is smoggy' can be taken as ambiguous. someone ignorant of astronomy can say this and fail to identify venus as the second planet from the sun,in which case the language does the work for him, so to speak- the sentence is T in virtue of a concept-concept pairing, which strikes my logically untuned ear as meaning that 'the second planet from the sun' is a second-order predicate, which ranges over predicates- in this case the first-order predicate 'is smoggy,' which ranges over objects.
ok, that's all mangled.
if we accept possible worlds we can say that 'the present king of france' is an object.
but we can't say 'there is a present king of france' is T, because any identification of an object as the present king of france would be an error.
i don't like this however.
> > and thus 'there is a present king of france and that king of france is bald' is F.
>
> Yep.
>
> But there isn't a contradiction anymore...
>
> :-(
>
> Crap.
>
> I'm sure it was neither true nor false because it led to contradiction if we regarded it as false...
>
> Zeugma...
>
> help...
>
ok, i tried.now please help me sort out my own mess.
:-(-z
Posted by zeugma on December 6, 2005, at 21:24:19
In reply to Re: Zeugma help!!!!! » alexandra_k, posted by zeugma on December 6, 2005, at 21:03:36
'there is no present king of france' is F because there is no object that can be paired with the concept 'present king of france.' this suggests substituitional quantification to me- ie. that it is bits of language that take the place of variables in quantified sentences.
when it is not too late i will post something about substitutional quantification.
if i did the research now i would be up all night, and that would be very, very bad.
will post on substituitional quantification asap (in case anyone is holding their breath).
-z
Posted by AuntieMel on December 7, 2005, at 10:29:51
In reply to Re: Looking at it another way.... » Larry Hoover, posted by CamW on December 4, 2005, at 18:02:20
I just want to say....
I'm glad to actually finally be able to tell you hello. I read all the archives, so I feel like I know you.
Posted by CamW on December 8, 2005, at 1:51:05
In reply to Re: But wait! » CamW, posted by AuntieMel on December 7, 2005, at 10:29:51
Thanks Auntie - It was fun while it lasted, but then it got not fun, anymore. My ego got too big and I had to spend a fortune on Vaseline to grease the my head in order to get through doors.
Now my views on psychopharmacology have changed and I don't want to have to defend my beliefs (although I think that I could; but I just don't have the energy to do so).
It's not that I am sure that I'm right; it's just that I have no desire to shatter others hopes and belief systems. I'm happy to keep my warped thoughts to myself now. Also, I don't think that I am the "expert" that I once was (the more I learned, the less I knew for sure, until I was sure that I knew nothing at all).
Thanks for the compliments; it's nice to know that I may have helped some people along the way.
Sincerely - Cam
Posted by AuntieMel on December 8, 2005, at 14:22:55
In reply to Re: But wait! » AuntieMel, posted by CamW on December 8, 2005, at 1:51:05
You gave me the thing I needed at the time - hope.
And the knowledge that there isn't just one right answer. And what works for some might not work for me and that I had the right - or duty - to do some research of my own.
And the reminder that I pay the doctor, not the other way around.
Power!
Posted by zeugma on December 8, 2005, at 16:14:13
In reply to Re: Zeugma help!!!!!, posted by zeugma on December 6, 2005, at 21:24:19
well i am not up to writing a treatise on substitutional quantification or even reading one. it seems that the existential quantifier as standardly interpreted offers puzzles enough. and my stomach is killing me so i will write unsytematically and largely to get my mind off my innards.
'the second planet is smoggy' would typically not be said with the nominal phrase read as a definite description. i mean assuming an astronomer were speaking. the phrase would be read as a rigid designator, or name.
now a student who writes on her exam 'the second planet is smoggy' may well be using the nominal phrase as a description. descriptions contain existential quantifiers and these make sense where existence is in doubt- they assert that there is a second planet; an astronomer would hardly see the need for such an assertion. the existential quantifier is IMO canonically used in 'there' senetences, such as 'There is the planet i have been looking for' (neptune say, as uttered by leverrier). here we have a definite description as predicate, but this is not necessary. 'there is good news coming out of iraq' contains no definite description, yet it is clearly a tendentious assertion, the opening move in an argument as to whether this good news exists. here in fact we have a proposition which pairs the putative news (an abstract object) with a complex predicate, namely that the abstract object on display is legitimately paired with the predicate 'is good news coming out of iraq'(note that the object itself would not be 'news,' which seems to me to be part of the predicate, as indicated by its being syntactically dominated by the verb 'is'- the 'there' is the object denoted by the variable governed by the quantifier).
this sort of view does indeed take the reality of propositions most seriously. for this reason kaplan calls his metaphysics 'haeccetism', a latin term used by medieval logicians that means 'thisness.' now in the 'there' construction is evident the desire to get 'thisness' across, to get it into the proposition. hence the use of the quantifier, which i take to be a device to show the existence of such a proposition. however its structure is different from the proposition of direct reference, which contains the object itself (together with whatever predicates one wishes to attach to the object to make an ordered sequence of elements). This is how it works. I can say, 'The President is on TV,' and I can use my words to display the proposition that pairs Bush with the predicate 'is on TV.' (This assumes that I am acquianted with Bush in some way, so that my use of the definite (abbreviated) description is not necessary. He could in fact not be the President, and my words could be literally false (say if he had resigned suddenly) but nontheless I would have gotten something across, much like I can indicate a certain man sitting in the back of the bar as 'the man drinking a martini,' though in fact he is drinking lemonade. I am far from asserting the existence of a man drinking a martini in the back, because if I were my words would not serve the purpose of indicating anyone; but I might well have successfully indicated him and paired him with a predicate (say 'stole my car'); and here it is not the nature of the liquid in his glass that is evaluated for truth, but the pairing of the guy with the criminal allegation. Or, at any rate, this is one way of evaluating, giving it a de re (of the thing) reading.
now if i had said 'the President does not advocate release of documents concerning response to a natural disaster,' the assertion is ambiguous. i could mean that BUSH does not advocate it, in which case the structure is simple; or i could intend the descriptive reading, in which case i would intend the existential quantification to be present as a means of calling attention to the description itself (perhaps i mean that whoever is president of the U.S., Bush, Clinton, Nixon, or Abraham Lincoln, is not going to release such documents as a matter of course; or i could mean indeed that Bush does not, but i intend its force to be existential, just as if i were leverrier discovering neptune, i would excitedly assert that a planet hitherto unknown existed- i.e. making a claim of some, novel importance).
anyway. if these reflections are of any use yo you, alexandra, or anyone else, i'd be pleased, but have to admit i've mostly been indulging my own taste for desert landscapes. it's a private, aesthetic matter.
-z
Posted by zeugma on December 8, 2005, at 16:36:20
In reply to existential doubts, existential quantifier, posted by zeugma on December 8, 2005, at 16:14:13
the existential quantifier is IMO canonically used in 'there' senetences, such as 'There is the planet i have been looking for' (neptune say, as uttered by leverrier).>>
no, i don't like this either. presumably leverrier would have said this with neptune is his telescope, and the TRUTH of his assertion would have rested on the proposition <Neptune, planet he was looking for>; though his utterance would have expressed the existential quantifier/description apparatus, say to his friend who did not have Neptune so positioned. the existential quantifier like the universal quantifier is needed for purposes of argument and generality, and in fact adds immensely to expressive power of language, but truth 'rests' (to speak metaphorically, and fully knowing that i havent thought this through at all) on singular or individual propositions (though no doubt the majority of such propositions are inexpressible in language anyway, hence the great utility of quantification [very unhappy with how i'm formulating this, but am writing it anyway, for whatever utterances such as this are worth]}.
-z
Posted by alexandra_k2 on December 13, 2005, at 21:11:42
In reply to Re: existential doubts, existential quantifier, posted by zeugma on December 8, 2005, at 16:36:20
hey. now i can't spell this to save myself... but i remember reading a bit about heccaity (or primitive thisness is easier to spell...) a few years back...
something about... leibniz has a couple of laws... one of them was
the indescernability of identity
(thoguh maybe i got the name wrong)
if a has a property that b lacks
then a cannot be b
(which is great for trying to figure whether the mind is the body...)and i think there was another
the identity of indescerbibles
(though maybe I got the name wrong)
if a and b have all the same properties
then a is band some people think the latter law falls out of the former...
but this has been disputed.i remember reading something about...
if there is a universe / world... and... (i don't think i can describe this in a neutral way...) but all that exists is two qualitatively identicle balls of iron.
they have all the same properties. including relative location. and so if the latter law is correct then there can only be one ball of iron. but surely there are two balls of iron...
and that is supposed to show the second law to be false...
and thus...
there is primitive thisness.
hmm.
hmm..what do you reckon?
i think...
so
i think so...
Posted by zeugma on December 15, 2005, at 10:54:29
In reply to Re: existential doubts, existential quantifier » zeugma, posted by alexandra_k2 on December 13, 2005, at 21:11:42
yes, primitive thisness was used to argue against Leibniz and the example of the iron balls was used to support some kind of 'haeccescist; (can't speell either) argument.
Locke as I remember has some kind of argument along these lines.
The problem is that Leibniz' laws seem to be true.
But our knowledge of objects' properties can be limited or nonexistent in many cases. Evans makes the requirements for getting the objects into the proposition more stringent, by tying it to epistemological constraints such that knowing A means knowing which thing A is. The more epistemology enters into it, the less work the language does 'on its own.'
-z
This is the end of the thread.
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