<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;" class="">Okay, one last, and then I die, having created as much chaos in the world as it was my place to create.<br class=""><div><br class=""><blockquote type="cite" class=""><div class="">On May 1, 2019, at 8:09 AM, Nick Thompson <<a href="mailto:nickthompson@earthlink.net" class="">nickthompson@earthlink.net</a>> wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><div class=""><div class="">The Schrodinger's cat can be both dead and un-dead, but I cannot know a thing and not know it, except by equivocating on the meaning of "know\u201d. </div></div></blockquote><div><br class=""></div><div><div>Careful here. You used the word \u201cbe\u201d \u2014 are you sure you know what that was supposed to stand for?</div><div><br class=""></div><div>You used the word \u201cI\u201d when you spoke of knowing a thing and not knowing it \u2014 are you sure you know what that \u201cI\u201d stands for? Meaning, are you sure you know what kinds of \u201cI\u201d are capable of existing in this physical universe? This was the Wigner\u2019s Friend conversation for which Aaronson\u2019s blog is good to clear the fog: <a href="https://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=3975" class="">https://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=3975</a></div><div><br class=""></div><div>I am not recommending _equivocation_ on the meaning of \u201cknow\u201d. I understand that any sentence can be unraveled, and the whole edifice of conversation destroyed, by constantly objecting \u201cwhat is \u2018is\u2019?\u201d, \u201cwhat is \u2018what\u2019?\u201d etc. People who want to be annoying do that, and I can\u2019t (or won\u2019t) deal with them. What I am proposing is that, in some cases, we suddenly realize we can put some definite better thing in place of the usage habit we had heretofore. Then the project of realizing that we didn\u2019t know the constraints on good usage of a term is not meant to unravel conversation, but to incrementally raise it. We continue to use all the rest provisionally, understanding that it is all fragile, but moving on until we find the next place we an make a concrete change for the better.</div></div><br class=""><blockquote type="cite" class=""><div class=""><div class="">I don't think quantum theory applies to logic in the familiar world. Or does it? Am I wrong to be bloody minded about people who bring "lessons from quantum theory" into day-to-day macro-world scientific arguments? <br class=""></div></div></blockquote><div><br class=""></div><div>Presumably all these languages are coarse-grained. Whether one or another rule applies (even if it was shown to apply somewhere) will depend on whether the tokens that require it are retained under the coarse-graining, or are replaced by other aggregate tokens to which the same rules do not apply. Case by case.</div><div><br class=""></div><div>Moriturus te saluto</div><div><br class=""></div><div>Eric </div><div><br class=""></div><blockquote type="cite" class=""><div class=""><div class=""><br class="">Nick <br class=""><br class="">Nicholas S. Thompson<br class="">Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology<br class="">Clark University<br class=""><a href="http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/" class="">http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/</a><br class=""><br class=""><br class="">-----Original Message-----<br class="">From: Friam [mailto:friam-bounces@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Steven A Smith<br class="">Sent: Tuesday, April 30, 2019 10:10 PM<br class="">To: friam@redfish.com<br class="">Subject: Re: [FRIAM] A Question For Tomorrow<br class=""><br class="">Nick -<br class=""><br class=""><blockquote type="cite" class="">That's both a tautology AND an oxymoron. <br class=""></blockquote><br class="">Did you just exclude the law of the excluded middle? How very human of you!<br class=""><blockquote type="cite" class=""><br class=""> "How do we explain consciousness?" in any way that is not inane. <br class="">(Geez, was that a quadruple negative?)<br class=""></blockquote>And a 4 dimensional version of same? <br class=""><br class=""><br class="">- Steve<br class=""><br class=""><br class="">============================================================<br class="">FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv<br class="">Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com<br class="">archives back to 2003: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/<br class="">FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove<br class=""><br class=""><br class="">============================================================<br class="">FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv<br class="">Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College<br class="">to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com<br class="">archives back to 2003: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/<br class="">FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove<br class=""></div></div></blockquote></div><br class=""></body></html>