https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-Euclidean_geometry

A square is a 4-sided figure if I remember correctly. So calling a 3-sided or 5-sided figure a "square" is tweaking with the definition - keeping the corner right-angle property but relaxing the requirement of 4 sides. This is very elementary geometry, my area of expertise. :grin:

Can you figure out why the peppy mathematician in the video calls a THREE and FIVE sided object a SQUARE?

Featherless bipeds, anyone?

This got me thinking about how we tend to establish a well defined and solid conceptualization of who we are,what are our ethics of conduct and what we are doing for the well being of our peers, families, and species and how it seems to work well in general. — Ariel D'Leon

And you've stuck your toe into water that can get deep enough to swim in at least, and deep enough to drown in. The trick is to define a system of givens/axioms/presuppositions/definitions/goals - what ever you want to call them and are appropriate for the field you're in. TheMadFool @TheMadFool's point above is to the point. Three- and five-sided figures are not squares.

Or in other words, in order to be able to get where you're going, you have to know where you want to go - and it helps if you know how to get there, but this last is problematic and sometimes what makes life interesting - also annoying. But you have to know, as best you can, and that requires preliminary decisions.

The world is out there, but nothing about the world is out there, that's all in here. And a fantastic amount of energy is wasted by folks who cannot keep track of this simple fact and try to wrest wrong conclusions from non-existing facts.

But this also requires qualification, possibly many but at least one: "fact(s)" must be carefully defined. There are people who will argue, for example, that because morality is not a thing, then there is no such thing as morality. Their account is that indeed it's all "in here," and as such is whatever any individual says it is, "in here" being nothing more than individual mind. But we know that morality, love, justice, idea, number - and all of the baggage and trappings of how we are in the world, is real. But it's a problem how to reckon it all. Welcome to the community of folks who ask such questions!

Featherless bipeds, anyone? — S

Wrong site, s. Back on your meds and put on your reading glasses.

Wrong site, s. Back on your meds and put on your reading glasses. — tim wood

Sorry, I thought this was KFC. (Or KFFB, as I like to call it).

Sorry, I thought this was KFC. — S

Lol. You win this one!

Hey Tim

Thanks for the reply! yes indeed i believe we need a system of presuppositions in order to have a perspective of the objects of study, in the case of the example i put through, i'm trying to dig about how can we improve our definitions and givens to get a more complete perspective of the real.

And about the goal, that can be defined by every individual as he pleases, i guess as you say, can we ever really get to know how to be on this world?, i'm sure in the end we all have to make the preliminary decision and go with that.

But anyway i'm always been a loner who ask such questions, so it's nice to be welcomed in a community
i'll stick around as much as i can.

The world is out there, but nothing about the world is out there, that's all in here. And a fantastic amount of energy is wasted by folks who cannot keep track of this simple fact and try to wrest wrong conclusions from non-existing facts. — tim wood

better to know that fact while also wrestling with all the conclutions :lol:

Sorry, I thought this was KFC. — S

ok but why though :rofl:

Draw me a 3 sided square.

ok but why though :rofl: — Ariel D'Leon

I forgot to put on my reading glasses.

Or I didn't, and the whole thing was actually a joke. But not just a joke: a joke making reference to an example used throughout the history of Western philosophy of an unsatisfactory definition of the term "human being", which, more generally, is the problem you touch upon in your opening post.

Although it was the former. I just forgot to put on my reading glasses.

But, being the possibility that our perception of the great scheme of existence is incomplete, our conceptualizations might be terribly unfitting or inadequate for such purposes, hence the complications we have been facing throughout history.

Do you think that for us humans the conquest of dimensionality, it's an attainable goal, in the pursue of our balance with the medium we live in?

please let me know if you have any important reference on this topic. — Ariel D'Leon

Christopher HItchens, dying from cancer, was asked at the start of a debate how he was. He said, thank you for the question. I'm dying. But then so are you!

Thus "balance" becomes a not-so-simple concept, the word itself a shorthand for what it isn't, and thereby misleading. Balance being usually a static state, whereas life is a dynamic system, a process, towards death. But in as much as the concept is useful and works in shorter term, there is therein a clue. Conceptualizations - good term! - each has its frame of reference, outside of which it doesn't work, or is applied in error. Scale, then, and framework become part of the mix.

You use above in your OP "insufficient" and "incomplete." Two different ideas, my point here is that the incomplete can be sufficient. And as sufficient, is right. And even that "complete," mis-applied, can be wrong. Love your neighbor, for example, may be a complete concept (for example), but it won't do on the battlefield for most people.

References:
An Essay on Metaphysics, R. G. Collingwood. He "lays out and lays bare" what presuppositions are and their purposes and functions, as well offering a compelling definition for what metaphysics is.

Nichomachean Ethics, Aristotle. Look for the most readable translation. A system of "balance."

The Hermeneutics of Original Argument, P. C. Smith. A thorough recovery, explication, and "laying out and laying bare" of the original oral/aural temporal nature of argument using words as the names of things in mutual consultation with people kindly disposed to one another in community in order to arrive at a decision as to what to do, and its evolution into the use of words as signs for abstract entities used for voiceless visual "demonstrations" to arrive at an agreement between otherwise disinterested and disengaged onlookers as to what is, or is not, the case.

And the Bible wouldn't hurt, except I have never encountered anyone who understands it for what it is (as opposed to what lots of people claim it to be), a manual for behavior for the most part based in sound psychology that's astute enough in itself to have lasted pushing 3,000 years and counting. A Yale lecturer named Christine Hayes, also an author, has on Youtube some 20 or so lectures on what the Bible is and in part what it says, in distinction and as against claims made by folks on both counts.

Hey Tim

Thanks for the references, i'll be sure to check them,

"insufficient" and "incomplete." — tim wood

and thanks for the burnt too maybe this is exactly what i needed, anyway this post it's something i wrote just for the sake of it, anyway it seems to have given more than enough of reward, i'll be sure to check more of your publications in the future.

I love the Numberphile videos. In this case, it appears he's working off of the conundrum faced long ago regarding the 5th postulate.

The best part of science (and math) for me is reading about the incisive minds in the field and how they wedge their scalpels into the seams and expose to the layman a world that is bursting with novelty.

At one point a thought crossed my mind around dimension itself. Reviewing the math behind fractional numbers, negative numbers and 0 as an exponent on Numberphile, I wondered whether dimension, seemingly incontrovertibly discrete, had any meaning as a fraction.

And, of course, it has been considered.

I have on my list of questions for God (or the FSM or the Great Pumpkin), if I ever get the chance, whether existence is at some level "closed" or whether it is, alternatively, infinitely interesting.

Hi Joseph S!

Thanks for your reply, yes it seems to me very interesting to think about the hypothetical applications that math can bring into the table for metaphysics, one of the ideas that boggles me is how come math comes so naturally and logically to our minds, like it was a part of nature itself, but our internal nature.

At one point a thought crossed my mind around dimension itself. Reviewing the math behind fractional numbers, negative numbers and 0 as an exponent on Numberphile, I wondered whether dimension, seemingly incontrovertibly discrete, had any meaning as a fraction. — JosephS

I haven't thought of dimension like that, but now that you mention it it's sure to be an interesting trip, i'll be checking the link before the day finishes. if you have any other interesting topic like this one feel free to mention me so i can catch up later!

And here is the whole (hole?) of philosophy writ small.

@TheMadFool will insist that squares are, all of them, four sided.

You conclude that we need a system of presuppositions...

Tim seems to think it depends on individual reference frames.

And so on.

One can choose whatever approach one likes here - there is nothing that forces us to comply with one view or another. If there were, we would not be arguing...

Philosophical issues consist in such word play. Wittgenstein. Look to the use, not the meaning. All that.

I haven't thought of dimension like that, but now that you mention it it's sure to be an interesting trip, i'll be checking the link before the day finishes. if you have any other interesting topic like this one feel free to mention me so i can catch up later! — Ariel D'Leon

A couple of other videos regarding the genesis and promise of string theory:
String theory explained
Brian Greene

This reflects the sort of scalpel-wielding that I find incredibly engaging.

Added to the reproduction list, Kurzgesagt is one of my favorite channels. thx!

A figure with similar sides and 90° angles is a square, a featherless biped is a man, a door without a knob is a wall, and a tiny toothless cat with no arms or legs is a slug.

And Banno is an old goat.