Intergalactic Summit

You are asking me to accomplish the impossible, and then smugly implying that my opinions are worthless when I am naturally unable to accommodate this unreasonable demand. That is not a debating strategy, it's intellectual cowardice.

The proof for induction is in its utility, as I have said. It produces propositions, we test them, and progress from there. The language and rules of logic produce estimates which we chase up, and when we do we typically find ourselves advancing in our understanding.

At no point is this process prescriptive - it is predictive. To return to the staircase, logic doesn't TELL me that the staircase continues beyond the turn; it estimates that as being the most likely scenario and leaves it up to me to determine what's actually going on. Logic, in short, does not declare boolean values of truth and falsehood: it assigns probability and nothing more. Actual certainty, in the language of rationality, is like the speed of light: Possible to approach, impossible to reach.

So, I cannot provide PROOF for the validity of inductive reasoning, but I can provide overwhelming supporting evidence. I can, through demonstration of its utility, reduce the likelihood of induction not being valid to an infinitesimal value which would imply a conspiracy of mind-distorting complexity and cruel cunning... or I can choose to say that betting on rolling all 1s on a billion dice each with a trillion sides is a fool's gamble.

So. When I'm staring at such immense odds, trust is only reasonable. Trusting your hardsuit to keep you alive in vacuum is reasonable. Holding your breath and having faith that god will rescue you is not. The former has demonstrably performed that function many millions of times for many millions of people. The latter has not even been properly demonstrated to exist.

Trusting induction is perfectly fine - it has been instrumental over the centuries in driving our technological progress. The fact that I can't resolve a paradox and provide the impossible proof you demand in no way undermines the reasonable nature of that trust. I don't have Faith in induction because faith is what you resort to when you don't have the luxury of understanding.

I think you owe her a billion ISK, Nicoletta.

The latter is not Faith, it's superstition. You're building up straw men, Mr. Stitcher.


By the same argument, I could say trusting the Amarr religion ist perfectly fine - it has been instrumental over the centuries in driving our technological, cultural and individual progress, to the point of producing the oldest, most stable polity of New Eden. The fact that I can't provide rational justification and provide the impossible proof you demand in no way undermines the reasonable nature of the trust in God.

The conjecture that you would 'understand' inductive reasoning in any substantial way more than I do the Amarrian religion or the divine is pure speculation on your part and thus: conjecture.

You'd have to show why pragmatic justification is valid with reasoning, while it is not with religion or faith in the divine. Also, I already adressed your invalid stipulative definition of 'faith'.

This leads us to the point: Why should you expect us to not demand from you to accomplish just that impossible thing that you demand of us? If you ask for rational justification of trust in God, I can equally demand that you rationally justify your trust in logics. As there obviously are pragmatic justifications for the Amarrian religion (as it doesn't entail your demagoic fantasy of holding breath in space), just as there are such for logics.

First, this operation isn't a proof, it is - as you state, axiomatic. Second, mathmatical induction is actually a sspecific type of deductive resoning. Third, you have to show that ordinable objects are ordinable without the existence of the ordinal numbers, not because there are ordinal numbers. You'd also have to show that ordinable obejects are ordinable by nature rather than convention. Third, you'd have to show that there really is a correspondence between the realm or material objects and abstract objects, that are numbers, as well as the nature of that relation.

So, I'm not rejecting the inductive form, but I reject that what you presented here is a strict, formal and valid demonstration of the matter at hand. At best it is elliptic and you would have to fill in the gaps. That there are dire consequences in rejecting something doesn't mean that the affirmation is already proven.


Your mind is filled with irrational thoughts, it seems.

Well, don't let us be fussy: It's also been crucial to the scientific development of the Amarr Empire.


So what? We rely on slavery. As you might know slavery was typically not a mark of the 'stone age' to begin with. Also, it's plainly just your opinion, not a fact, that slavery is the sign of an underdeveloped culture. Also, your interpretation that the Empire made progress despite it's religion not because of it lacks substantial evidence: It was mainly church men who were responsible for the major breakthroughs and it was religion that was meticulously recording it. Youi should have a look into those parts of the Scriptures sometime.


Call it whatever you like to call it. I would call such an empoverished, materialistic worldview as yours sad as well. This isn't an opining contest though: Unless you were heading out from the start to advertise rather than argue.


See, jokes are non-rational, not irrational. But I'm happy you agree at last that human rationality is bounded.

I'm sorry. I can't let this stand any longer.

PIE is set red to the the Alexlyva Paradox for crimes against the scientific method and for being horribly irritating and patronizing in the aggressive pursuit of their own correctness.

Does a hammer or starship exist independently of the humans who built it? Yes, in that they are discreet objects, no in that they would not have arisen had people not been around to create them.

The same is true for rationality. We invented it, so it wouldn't exist without us, but it is not a human, but rather is a tool that humans use. And if there's one limit that humanity seems not to have, it's the capacity to create endlessly effective tools.

"Human behaviour is economic behaviour" is a basic tenet of the State. It's possible that I'm sticking to that one out of indoctrination, but I have not yet seen anything which proves it wrong, and have seen much that proves it right.

And I don't care what their religion demands they do, or what rank they may have in the clergy. If they're conducting science, they are categorically a scientist, regardless of whatever silly robes and hats they may wear, or whatever time-wasting rituals they may have to perform.

This argument, that inductive reasoning is valid by axiom, can easily be applied to other forms of logic, ma'am.



Yes, ma'am. To prove by induction, one demonstrates the two required properties - that the set includes a foundational point and that the set is incrementally non-terminating. From this one deduces the proof.

It is important that, when doing this, one states that the proof is by induction, however. This fact that the inductive form is used within a deductive process is one of the reasons we feel induction to be a valid argument.



Objects are ordinable by dint of their arrangeability in sequence. Numbering them is not required for this property. This property can be demonstrated experimentally. Sadly it cannot be demonstrated by proof, which is only sensible as we are discussing the validity of proofing.



This can be demonstrated experimentally. As above, proofing this property is impossible as we are discussing the validity of proofing.



I wasn't presenting a formal or strict definition of the inductive form, ma'am. I was casually presenting the primary example of the inductive form, in the formation of the natural numbers. I apologize for my lack of rigour; please allow me to re-present the example.

P1) The natural number 0 exists.
P2) Natural numbers are reflexive.
P3) Natural numbers are symmetric.
P4) Natural numbers are transitive.
P5) Natural numbers are closed under equality.
P6) Every natural number n has a successor, S(n).
P7) For every natural number n, S(n) is not zero.
P8) The successor function is injective.

C1) The natural numbers are an infinite set.

From here we then use induction to demonstrate that this is a complete set. If you will allow me the use of second order logic, I will formulate the argument as:

I1) If N exists and is a set such that:
I2) 0 is in N, and
I3) For every natural number n, if n is in N, then its successor S(n)is also in N,

c2) N consists of all of the natural numbers; i.e. no natural numbers exist outside of N.

Do you accept that the above is valid argument? If so, you accept second-order induction as valid in logical proofing. If not, there are dire effects for mathematics.

Addition is a function of repeated applications of succession. Thus, it relies on the deductive arguments that create the natural numbers. It also relies on the inductive argument that ensures that the natural numbers are complete. So both of these forms are involved, yes! They aren't equal methods, but can come to the same conclusions, i.e. the proofs can be equivalent. So, sort of?

It looks like some people went to a semantics convention, got drunk, and thew up everywhere.

Really, what a waste of a positive message. Someone tries to say "hey, don't be selfish because of God" and someone has to debate the God part. It's fine if you're an arrogant athiest, and it's fine if you hate everything Amarr at face value, but please don't drag down a missive that is trying to change people for the better just because you personally have a problem with the concept of a higher power that is by nature impossible to prove or disprove.

People believe in God, or gods, or magic faires. That's part of what makes us human. Deal with it.