Veterans Day Parade

Today I got to March in the Veteran's Day Parade. I hope I did not get on TV or anything. It was weird watching all these people videotape you and take pictures of you though. It was not a bad event and we even had some fun.

Review of Penelope Maddy's Realism in Mathematics

Maddy's Realism in Mathematics is a spirited defense of the position she calls “compromise Platonism” and “set theoretic realism” in the philosophy of mathematics. The position is that Mathematical objects, sets in particular, exist, just like ordinary medium size objects exist.

The book is really good, and I won’t really summarize it here. But basically what happens is that she defend this position on epistemological grounds. Maddy claims that we have the same epistemic access to mathematical objects as we do for any other. (This is a way of handling one of the famous Benacerraf problems.) That is we form beliefs about sets, from a psychological perspective, the same way we do about ordinary objects. We also perceive sets in the same way we perceive ordinary objects. There is also a section on defending the axioms of set theory. We need some intuitive grounds for choosing the axioms that set theory uses, as they are the other part of the problem. The sets are one thing, and the axioms for set theory another.

I have some problems with the book which I will outline below, however, despite the length of the critiques, the book was a good, and important read. It is definitely going to stay an important book in the philosophy of mathematics for a while.

Much of what follows are just random points that I wanted to make about the book.

My first problem with the book is that I really do not see the similarity between forming beliefs about objects and sets. They just seem way too different. The similarities are apparent, and I can’t help thinking that a question is being begged somewhere. We form beliefs about set, but that is if the sets exist. If not the beliefs we form are merely a convenient fiction, or a convenient way of talking.

What if all the sets disappeared and only their elements were left? What would the world look like? Maddy often jumps from elements to elements of a set. I find that jump a bit unintuitive.

Maddy often talks as if number supervenes on objects. (see for example on p 158.) As long as there are objects, there is number. I find that kind of talk odd.

On p 89 the following claim is made: “Knowledge of numbers is knowledge of sets because numbers are properties of sets.” Is that a valid inference? I do not see how that follows.

Axioms are not really all that intuitive. Their usefulness in math is not, contrary to Maddy’s claim, akin to indispensability arguments in physics. We would not loose arithmetic if the axiom of choice were forbidden. Mathematics would just be somewhat more impoverished. But we could still do much of it. There is nothing wrong with that. No one ever complained that there were too few fundamental forces or things that follow from them. The more axioms we have, the more robust our mathematics is. But adding an axiom because it is somewhat useful is not the same as adding something that fundamental that it is indispensable to the discipline.

Along with that, Maddy makes use of a notion of “intrinsic support” which seemed unclear. I thought the analogy with science was misleading too.

The sixth problem I had was that when talking about “extrinsic support” for axioms the phrase “verifiable consequences” is used in a very strange way. Maddy is using it to mean that an axiom can be said to have verifiable consequences if we show that the axiom that the theorem relies on can be proved without it. But as far the theorems that do not need the axiom, it shows us nothing, ie, at best the axiom is unnecessary, and at worst it is false. And what about the theorems that can’t be proved without the axiom? Are those the unverifiable ones? The existence of those theorems tells us that there are cases for which the axiom is “unverifiable.” And the verifiable ones tell us that the axiom is superfluous. Thus it seems that the condition is, at the very least, odd. So, in looking for “extrinsic conditions” for supporting a given axiom, being verifiable, is unhelpful. (And keep in mind that the way it appears, “verifiable” is only used as a partial analogy with science.)

“Natural” is also not used in the same way when assessing extrinsic support. Some mathematical consequences are considered “natural”. It is hard to say what that means though. The given example is the “zigzag pattern of separation properties in the projective hierarchy generated by projective determinacy (and hence SC) is considered more natural than the Pi-side pattern of V=L.” Without explaining what this means a pattern like: /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\. . . . seems more natural than /\__________. . . . I personally do not see this. Certainly there is a sense in which the former has a certain appeal, but I am not sure if it is a mathematically significant appeal. Here is why. There is a very simple analogue to our “unnatural” pattern. That is the distribution of primes among the even versus odd numbers. That pattern is /\___________, where the first (and only) “peak” is the number 2, the only even number. The rest lie with the odds. So I am not sure what to make of the “natural” criterion and why it is valuable as a guide to valuable intuitions.

Next, a problem I had with chapter 2 is that just because for some reason we form set in our head, and we can generate a coherent epistemology, that does not show we have a coherent metaphysics. Isn’t the whole epistemological discussion contingent on the metaphysics being correct? If not it is like having an epistemology about unicorns. I can tell you how we see them, but only if they are really there. I can even tell you how to see them if they are not, and that is a problem.

Finally, and this is no fault of Maddy’s, and to her credit she deals with a nascent theory, the penultimate section deals with issues of structuralism. The section seems like it would benefit from more work on structuralism. What may stem from Shapiro, and the promising work emerging from Koslow’s logic were not available when she wrote the book, though it might be worth rewriting the section given new developments.

Sorry these were really schetchy notes on the book. But it was definitely worth the effort reading it.

The Day the Enlightenment Went Out?

The NY Times has a piece by some Professor, Gary Wills whose main point seems to be that the reason Bush got elected was because people are fairly uncritical and Faith, or misinformation triumphed over fact. Naturally he is wrong. That article was pathetic. The election does not symbolize a triumph of belief over fact. I would be willing to bet anything that your average redneck, if told by Bush himself that there was no connection between Quaida and Iraq would still vote for Bush. Could you see him going to church on Sunday in his pick-up truck saying that he no longer can vote for Bush because he found out this interesting fact, that Iraq and Qaida are not really connected? Or he is going hunting with his friend and he just shoots a deer, and in their quiet moment when they just got finishing gutting their kill, he tells his friend that he is not too sure about how much he actually believes in the BS that the good reverend Billy Bob spouts every Sunday. You think he will then decide, well, as long as I am having religious doubts, I will go back to standard working class values like socialized health care, legalization of weed, and gay marriage, and then go vote Democrat? These people do not vote for Bush because they believe in some nutty things. They believe in those nutty things because they are they type to vote for Bush.

This was a very pathetic article spouting the standard crappy lines that let the left keep feeling good about itself. It allows the left to retain its self-righteousness by saying that everyone who doesn't agree with them is a medieval, backward, racist, and that the reason why their country did not win is not because people evaluated the merits of the candidates and more people liked their opponents. But rather because there are more nuts out there than sane people. That happens to be true, but they forget that they are just as nutty for believing these political dogmas, as these other types are believeing academic dogmas. If you tell a Kerry supporter that Iraq did sponser terrorism to the tune of $25,000 per suicide bomber, thus make Saadam Heussain a major sponsor of terrorism he will simply counter that there was one terrorist group that we have no evidence that he supported, namely Quaid. Thus it is bad to want him ousted, because we have no evidence he supported our particular terrorist group. . . . The economic dogmas that lefties believe make even less sense.

I hate these fucking NY Times writers who have a mandate to write whatever sounds good to their lefty audience regardless of how little sense it makes, and what is even worse is that smart people read it and get suckered in to thinking it makes sense. This guy probably told the same thing to his history class back at Northwestern, and they all probably wrote it down, and it will probably be on their final exam, and we will see the rise of another stupid and uncritical generation of students.

However, and we see this in the end of Professor Wills' piece, I do suspect that now we will start seeing a lot of begging for favors. They will all take the same form: Bush is a miserable fanatic. BUT, to prove he is a uniter and not a divider, and to heal this country, he should really do what the democrats want him to do. Naturally he can't do that because he got elected precisely because he said he would not do those things.

So as much as I want Bush to change his backward ways about many things, the democrats put him in a corner where he had to appeal to those who would never let him change. I do take solace in the fact that it is usually the right who takes the bold and often unpopular steps toward Justice, and conciliation. (eg, Nixon going to China, signing Title IX, getting out of Vietnam. Reagan making MLK day a federal holiday, Begin making peace with Egypt. Sharon Pulling out of Gaza. . . ) The left never has a mandate to do these things. They are generally supported by the fanatics and strongly opposed by the right and the moderates. The right is generally unopposed except by people farther to the right than them, and NOONE will ever care what they think.

Let the healing begin

This whole election is really over. Finished. It is now time to heal and rebuild. The media tends to tell us that we are a divided nation. If that is true (and I am skeptical) then we must start to rebuild, with the Republicans toning down on their retrogressive religious agenda, and the Democrats getting rid of some of their rabid hate of anyone different then them.

But that is not the real healing I am talking about. The real healing we need in this country is not on a political party scale, but rather on a personal and individual one.

You may recall a scene toward the end of Orwell's 1984, after he was tortured and he finally loved big brother. There was a point when he could hold out no longer and he just gave in, despite what he really believed, and what he really felt.

I too remember that I was on the verge of caving, and I had many sane friends who actually did. In New York there was tremendous pressure to hate Big Brother. People expressing support for Bush were socially ostracized, talked about, vilified, isolated, condemned, shamed, and otherwise invited to feel like they were mediaeval simpletons. I personally experienced all of this. I was censured, insulted, yelled at, and made fun of.

In response I had to stop communicating with some of my more rabid friends. I spoke with exactly zero of my academic colleagues, as they were all flaming Nader-is-a-bit-too-far-to-the-Right types. I took to lashing out on my students for their poor and sloppy thinking about this, even though they were all just repeating what they had heard in their sociology classes. I had no meaningful discussions about this election, because those who stayed my friends tended to agree with me, and those who did not agree were impossible to talk to.

I became very close with those who agreed with me. We hunkered down and came to feel like it was us against the world - and that really built up a sense of camaraderie.

But it is over. Perhaps in a few days when the flow of Bush-really-stole-the-elections-again-.-.-.-I-saw-them-burning-Kerry-ballots!!!!!! emails dies down, we can start to rebuild our friendships.

I know it is easy to say this when you are the " winner". I like to think that I would have said this regardless of who won the election. But I really do want my New York back. I really want us to go back to the way things were. Bush got the votes of 40% of the state, and 25% of my county. That makes 1 in every 4 Brooklynites who probably feel like they won the election but lost their friends.

I am grateful to have had many friends who place friendship before politics, though few of them could stand to mix friendship with politics. I thank them.

I would like to make a public appeal to the good citizens (and visitors) of my beloved city: Can't we all just get along?

The time has come to make these next four years one of progress and coexistence. We can be bitter and hate each other and sit in wait for the next election so we can get another chance, we can continue to feel resentment, OR, we can work toward making New York a better place now. I think that it is time New York had a Take Your Formal Political Rival To Lunch week. Become friends again. Hook up. Forget politics for a bit. Talk about the future. We have three and a half years before we have to see another political campaign add that we care about. Relish it. Because, come 2008, you will not be on speaking terms.

Why this election sucks

I am so glad that the election season is over, and we can stop listening to all this election crap. Now I predict the courts will be doing battle for another few days and there will be fodder enough for countless books and angry Americans to complain to their grandchildren.

This has been a crappy campaign, and whoever wins should not be too proud of himself. Whoever the winner is, he failed to unite the American people. The electorate will be angry for the next four yeas.

This campaign saw the rewriting of all the election rules. Thanks to the internet, campaign donations were transparent, a very annoying fact. Second, all sort of loopholes were found to evade every campaing finance law and we saw the financing of campaigns by billionarires with juvenile agendas. Third, campaign propoganda hit an all time low with the likes of Michael Moore's junk, and all the partisian follow-up. Fourth, the debates made any sane person want to cry about the fact that one of the two debators will be the next president. Fifth, the number of lawyers involved in this election threatens to rewrite the nature of democracy itself, where elections are not decided by the people, and they are won by the side who can disqualify the most of their opponents votes. Sixth, third party candidates are increasingly marginalized. After the last election where it looked like there was a shot, now it will be a long time for a third part candidate to get any respect. Finally, thanks to the entertainment industry, we will most likely have the highest politically-illiterate number of people voting ever. The election can normally rely on the fact that people who know absolutely NOTHING about the candidates are just not all that interested in voting, so that the actual electorate is somewhat informed. This year, we all suspect that there will be a high number of people voting just for the sake of pressing the shiny buttons in the secret box. MTV did a great disservice in getting out the stoner vote. These people are neiter informed nor concerned about the fate of the nation. There is no need for them to vote .

Knowing that the winner will not change the face of this countryvery much, many Americans will look back on this elecetion and ask themselves "What was I thinking?" To them I answer "absolutely nothing".

Most important election ever?

I am so sick of hearing people say that this is the most important elevtion ever. It is not at all. This election is rather trivial. The most important election in a long time was last election, though we really did not know it at the time.

Last election decided, in advance, how we were going to respond to the already planned events of 9/11. Last election decided that we would go in to Iraq. Last election decided what the US relationship to the world will be. Last election decided the US relationship to Israel. Last election decided whether or not the country would have a decent domestic policy, and how to respond to a wounded economy.

At this point, in the immediate future, the economy will not change dramatically regardless of who the US president is. This election cannot reverse the war on Terror or the war in Iraq. This election cannot reverse the precedent we set with the "Bush doctrine". This election will neither encourage nor discourage any great constitutional shifts.

This election will not change the patriot act. This election will not improve the plight of third party candidates. Actually it is already worse. This election already made a farce of our democracy by insisting that thousands of lawyers are needed to oversee the election - months before it happened.

This election might alter US environmental policy. I am not sure if it will be for the better or worse, but either way it is nothing urgent. This election might speed up funding on stem cells, but this is inevitable, it is just a question of "when it will happen".

This election has a good chance of deciding one or two supreme court Justices. There is also a good chance that the president will change the morale of the military for the worse. Taxes may go up a few hundred dollars for some.

So tell me why this is the most important election ever. This is one of those rediculous mantras that I wish people would stop repeating. An election in an important period in history, such as this most likely is, is not the same as an important election.

Review of The Burglar Who Studied Spinoza

I picked up Lawrence Block's The Burglar Who Studied Spinoza wondering if Spinoza's work might be involved there somehow. It was not. Spinoza's work was mentioned, not used.

But despite my disapointment with the complete lack of philosophy, it was a good quick novel. Wittgenstein was said to have an affinity for detective novels, and this is one he would probably have enjoyed.

There is this burglar, you see, who solves a burglary and a murder which he was somewhat deeply involved in.

The books is a rather quick read. Not overly memorable, but not bad either.

Good cause

Last night I hung out with "S" who is back from almost a year in Iraq on R and R. He has a lot to say about having been there. After a snack and beer in Yaffa on St. Mark's Place, we went to The Library for more Brooklyn Lagers, and then to that other bar on the corner of A and 2nd which was packed so we didn't stay. From there we went to Max Fish, but that too was too crowded, so we were off to Iggy's for more beer and White Russians. All good places, although none of them had Yingling taps that worked.

He told me about this program he is involved with that gets CDs for soldiers in Iraq. It seems like a worthy cause. It lets the troops know that they are thought about.

Review of Down and Out in Paris and London

Orwell's Down and Out in Paris and London is a good read. It is the more or less autobiographical story of Orwell's experience with the very-underclass of Paris and London.

In Paris we hear about what life is like for one who is forced to work as a plongeur or the lowest of the low in the resteraunt industry. The work, the sweat, the heat, the lack of sleep is all well described as is the life, accommodations, and frequent abuses of the individual.

The same is true of the life in London. We hear about what it is like to be a tramp. Much of the narrative is dedicated to describing the conditions in which these people were forced to endure. The final few chapters contain clear reformnist polemics about how to alleviate the plight of the tramp and the worker in England.

A few minor points. First: for those like me who speak no French, there are a few too many phrases that you will just not figure out. I hate missing the point of some line or paragraph because the author assumes I know another language. So in the first part of the book that takes place in Paris, there is a lot of local color added by throwing in many Frenchisms, there is also a bit lost because it got irritating.

Second, One sees the origins of Orwell's interest in language here. It is worth noting that Orwell has a section of Tramp Slang in the book, together with some etymological speculations.

Third, In this book, ones sees some early anti-Semitism on Orwell's part. In a 1945 anti-anti-Semitism Essay he writes that after 1934 anti-Semitism ceased alltogether to be respectable in literature and entertainment. Down and Out in Paris and London, published in 1933, apparently just makes the cut. There are at least half-a-dozen anti-semetic remarks and statements in the book which maight make one feel uncomfortable, if those sorts of things make you uncomfortable. Orwell changed later, but the early Orwell still has certain prejudices unexamined. This is particularly queer given the liberal minded nature of the work - improving the lot of those affliced by societal prejudice.

Overall though the book was a good and quick read, and it is a good examination of poverty in England. The bookd did not have the impact of say Jacob Riis's book about poverty in New York, but it should hit a sympathetic chord with anyone who reads it.

Review of Smoke Over Golan

Uriel Ofek's Smoke Over Golan was written in the very immediate aftermath of Israel's Yom Kippur War. The war was a rather close call for Israel. Israel was surprised, and there were some rather large inital setbacks.

This is a children's novel. It is about a boy whose parents more to the then-uncharted Golan Heights to a farm where he becomes the only child in his school. There are a few adventures and a subplot about the boy's friendship with a Syrian who lives in the valley below the farm in the Golan Heights. The friendship transcends the politics which were hardly understood by the 10-year old.

The sub-plot should have been more well developed, but the story was good - for a children's book. This is not profound literature, but I am sure it has amused many 11-year olds.

my week

So a bit of catching up on my week. I am on a three week mission. I am in New York and New Jersey almost the whole time, so I am not seeing any exotic locations or meeting really fascinating people, but I am doing something fairly OK, and working for good people. It is OK. I have to wake up really early every day, and I am pretty much with the same eight people all the time, but it is OK. The timing couldn't be worse though, getting me right in the middle of a semester.

I know things happened in the news, but I really did not have the time to see them. I heard Olive Drab this past Monday. They were good. I really like them live.

I got very little sleep lately.

I have had lots of conversations with lots of strangers on the subway lately. It is weird, quite a few strangers have started chatting with me. One was this gay guy who was really hitting me a lot. I was too polite, to the point of perhaps leading him on a bit. But then he got pretty obscene, and I felt a bit awkward. I wish women hit on me like that. Then there was this black guy who had been a military attache to various embassies. He was a pretty nice guy. I wish we had more time to chat. There were also these girls from my neighborhood who started to talk to me. On was interested in politics and the war in Iraq, and the other two were just weird. The list goes on.

I need sleep.

My Cereal Woes

I was in the supermarket mear my house the other day trying to get a few things I needed. One thing I really wanted was Alpha Bits cereal. I am a rather big fan. My supermarket carries - and I swear I counted - over 120 varieties of cereal, and there were no Alpha Bits. They did have the Alpha Bits with marshmallos, but I hate marshmallos. What is the world coming to? Over 120 varieties and no Alpha Bits!

Penn's self-righteous letter

By now we have all seen Sean Penn's arrogant letter to the makers of Team America World Police.

I still find it amazing that we let actors talk. I still find it amazing that actors are news. When we ask why the electorate is so uninformed, the answer seems so obvious. The media dedicates way too much space to what Sean Penn said about a movie.

Naturally, those who sit around and spend their time worrying about actors instead of politics should not vote. Who the heck wants semi-literate people who cannot distinguish reality from movies voting? I certainly don't.

(And for the Sean Penns out there I am one of those who may eventually be in harm's way in Iraq.)

Pick a zinger

An opinion piece in today's Columbia University Student Newspaper suggests that "It only takes one witty, original saying that will reach the undecided voters to determine this election". This is sadly true. The author actually seems to be endorsing that the candidates do this, ie, they pick a good line and ride it to victory.

It is sad that even those in our Ivy League have given up on political debate in favor of good one-liners.

Review of The Quark and the Jaguar

About 10 years ago, Murray Gell-Mann, the 1969 winner of the Noble Prize in Physics, wrote a rather interesting book: The Quark and the Jaguar. This book covers a whole variety of topics, but there seems to be two main points. The first point is scientific: that the universe is quite simple and from this simplicity all sorts of complex phenomena can emerge. The second point is polemical, namely that we should take care of the planet.

The author pretty much discusses or alludes to every famous scientific principle that is currently being talked about. Maxwell's Demon, genetic algorithms, Schrodinger's Cat, the theory of evolution, non-linear dynamics, market economies, Grand Unified Theories, and of course quantum mechanics, just to name a few. Gell-Mann clearly knows something about everything, and many of these things are interestingly discussed in the book, and a lot of them are even explained sufficiently so that you can get an idea of what it is.

(There is an interesting chapter on religious belief too, which I think might contain an early version of theories just coming out of cognitive science.)

Much of this sometimes seems disconnected, but the author is trying to describe the science of the simple and complex. Sometimes it seems to loose track of that. But the whole read, was, I thought, interesting.

At the end of the book it gets polemical. There is a slight nod toward explains the value of diversity on the planet. Both mostly there is a lot of discussion about how it should happen, what should be done, and what we would have to do to change. I thought that part of the book was weak, as I was not told why we should care about the rain forests, except that perhaps we might find some wonder drug there that some indigenous tribe has been using to cure cancer for millennia that noon picked up on yet. I would have liked to see some real good examples of what useful things ethnobotnists have found that we did not know about before. Also, I thought that the talk about the necessary change that would have to come about was very rough. I would have like some creative details.

But the book was a good read, and the style was sufficiently engaging. There were even a few interesting philosophical points along the way. It was definitely not time wasted in reading the book.