How much do you know about science topics?

[StuM]

Originally Posted by Singularity

Heraclitus pointed out this problem around ~2,500BC. He's the guy who came up with the idea of "logic" (logos) supposedly in the first place.

Cobblers! Heraclitus and logic are a world apart. There's a good reason he was called Heraclitus the Obscure. His "logic" was on a par with yours.

Anyone that thought that Pythagoras was a "fraud" is sadly lacking in logic.

[SeanPatrick]

I love a good brain teaser as much as anyone, but I've just about completely lost interest in whether Singularity's question has a meaningful answer or not. And I'd wager that most others here feel the same.


To Singularity: If your goal was to provoke some sort of "deep thought" about the way we perceive our world ... I have no other words but to say that I think you have failed. Perhaps you need to reevaluate your approach to provoking curiosity and keeping people interested. I don't know for sure - because I am nowhere near a master of that art. Mind you: this is simply my opinion, and I don't mean it as an affront.


If your goal was to troll the rest of us, then I must admit you have mildly succeeded.


Anyway, here's a video I actually did find interesting and which [at least] Singularity's question reminded me of:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pxb5lSPLy9c

[Singularity]

This tread asks what do you know about science topics. So what the heck is science? Do we define a word by democracy, or by tyranny, or is there something in the real world that ought to be the definition of what a word means?

Lewis Carrol:
"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty/Stu said, in rather a [characteristic of the breed] scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less." "The question is," said Alice/Synchronicity, "whether you can make words mean so many different things." "The question is," said Humpty Dumpty/Stu, "which is to be master—that's all."

This is how to define science outside of the tyranny of Master Stu-space:
science (n.)mid-14c., "what is known, knowledge (of something) acquired by study; information;" also "assurance of knowledge, certitude, certainty," from Old French science "knowledge, learning, application; corpus of human knowledge" (12c.), from Latin scientia "knowledge, a knowing; expertness," from sciens (genitive scientis) "intelligent, skilled," present participle of scire "to know," probably originally "to separate one thing from another, to distinguish," related to scindere "to cut, divide," from PIE root *skei- "to cut, split" (source also of Greek skhizein "to split, rend, cleave," Gothic skaidan, Old English sceadan "to divide, separate").

Humans split matter in half so as to look for patterns. Historically this is science. We must agree on this before going forward/down the rabbit hole.

So the ability...the capacity...of two humans to be able to see the same patterns in the same thing requires that each human have
a) the capacity to count for one's self (aka the ability to reason)
b) the capacity to recognize when others...too...have the exercised the same capacity to reason to while looking at the same thing

What the Nobel guy noticed is that some people NEED assistance from someone else to see patterns because such needy people cannot see patterns for themselves in certain circumstances because their ability to reason...vanishes (in Hegel-speak). Quite simply, when you cut some things into two (science!)...because of how the brain works...their mind goes blank. The 1,14,15 mean 10, what is 9 question exploits this and can tell "who is who." But as presented here, this phenomenon was recognized 2,500 years ago...and some people still cannot get it.

In other words, it's impossible to reason with a hypnotized chicken, but it's easy to hypnotize a chicken (post #36). 1,14,15 is merely a manner of ~hypnotizing with numbers; Hegel showed that this applies to word reasoning...how a skillful orator/author can literally entrance the audience so as to cause them to "over-think" which is why smart people don't get 100% on all tests. In Hegel-speak, the student becomes the slave of the idiotic-thinking master teacher who "invents logic on the fly" so as to confuse the student. This is an idiotic way to examine a person's ability to reason...to think...but such possible thanks to the imaginary solipsistic linear logic of Aristotle (vs the real-world inter-connected to the real world logic of Hericlitus).

Punch line for the still-confused types:
9 here refers alternatively to reason, statistical variance, physics moment. All the same logic (i.e. pattern) preserved between mathematics and physics. I'd expect a PhD at least know (i.e. recognize the pattern) that 9 relates to the variance about the mean of the given number set.

[Singularity]

Originally Posted by StuM

Cobblers! Heraclitus and logic are a world apart. There's a good reason he was called Heraclitus the Obscure. His "logic" was on a par with yours.

Anyone that thought that Pythagoras was a "fraud" is sadly lacking in logic.

Aristotle and cronies dispensed with the manner of thought (~doctrine of opposites) shared by both Pythagoras and Heraclitus. Focus on that.

Next, recognize that ~Eastern philosophy to this day continues the tradition of Pythagoras and Heraclitus.

Aristotle was a BS artist and solipsist; accordingly, Aristotle's version of "logic" is imaginary...and using it unplugs the thinker's mind from the world. When this happens...people use words like "meaning" and "reason" without actually 'thinking literally' or 'visualizing' what the hell they are saying. It predisposes people to be herded. It's a thought handicap of the highest order. And Western civilization thought/communication is based on this.

But what do I know...you didn't recognize a simple physics or statistics problem when it was shown to you because you need it to be shown to you as a physics problem. The universe is filled with these patterns...logos as Heraclitus would say (synchronicity in ~Eastern philosophy). You can't make a horse want to see the overlap of the patterns, but it bears mentioning that the human's visual pattern-recognition cognitive circuit is much, much older than the written/verbal communicative circuit. Hence, skepticism, etc ad nauseam.

FWIW I'm no fan of philosophy...it's most word games invented by people who do not think with pictures. But solipsism is important to understand as it is a disposition heavily associated with sociopathy, at least in the modern world.

[StuM]

Originally Posted by Singularity

I'd expect a PhD at least know (i.e. recognize the pattern) that 9 relates to the variance about the mean of the given number set.

So after all the psychobabble all we have learnt is that you doesn't know how to calculate a simple variance.
Looks like PhD really does stand for "Piled higher and Deeper" in this case

For your enlightenment:
Numbers 1, 14,15.
Sum = 30
Mean = 30 / 3 = 10
Differences from mean = -9, +4 + 5
Squares of the differences = 81, 16, 25
Sum of differences squared = 122
VARIANCE (Mean of differences squared )= 122 / 3 = 40.667

How does 9 "relate to" 40.667 ?

[Singularity]

Originally Posted by StuM

So after all the psychobabble all we have learnt is that you doesn't know how to calculate a simple variance.
Looks like PhD really does stand for "Piled higher and Deeper" in this case

For your enlightenment:
Numbers 1, 14,15.
Sum = 30
Mean = 30 / 3 = 10
Differences from mean = -9, +4 + 5
Squares of the differences = 81, 16, 25
Sum of differences squared = 122
VARIANCE (Mean of differences squared )= 122 / 3 = 40.667

How does 9 "relate to" 40.667 ?

To explain it further we'll need to get into concepts related to cognitive deficits associated most routinely with autism.

[StuM]

You're worse that the biblical numerologists.


I'm finished with your nonsense.

[Singularity]

Originally Posted by StuM

So after all the psychobabble all we have learnt is that you doesn't know how to calculate a simple variance.
Looks like PhD really does stand for "Piled higher and Deeper" in this case
....You're worse that the biblical numerologists.

The manner in which I learned math and physics causes me to see them as inseparable. It's one thing to be able to compute a variance, another to be able to see it outright such that the "9" thing (in this problem) comes up instantaneously.

In other words, to me, biblical numerologists and people more prone to 1,14,15-type cognitive dissonance are birds of a closer feather...and much more numerous.

*That people flee Western philosophy to Eastern philosophy (which is the ~same as pre-Aristotle Greek philosophy) with few people going the other way ought to 'say something' to a curious observer. And more elucidating...the few people to leave Eastern philosophy for ~Abrahamic philosophy....do so because of all of the mesmerizing biblical numeracy....that is incidentally much, much more refined in the ~contrived book written ~1400 years ago.

[admikar]

Originally Posted by S/V Illusion

If I can score 100%, anyone can

^^^^This.

[Jdege]

Originally Posted by tkeithlu

The question about deforestration bordered on tricky.

The question on deforestation depended upon unstated assumptions.

Deforestation can lead to increase erosion, but it doesn't have to.

Deforestation can lead to increase carbon emissions, but it doesn't have to.

It depends upon what you do with the trees and what you do with the cleared land..

[Kelkara]

"What term do we give for 9 with respect to the average of numbers 1, 14, and 15?"
Insist on a single-word answer...

I think the most useful word is "moment". But I still need 13 words to give a complete answer.

9 is the absolute value of the moment either side of the mean.

It is necessary to specify that the moment is only being considered on one side of the mean since of course the first moment of 1, 14 and 15 about the mean is zero. And of course the moment on the low side is -9 not 9 so we need the absolute value. The variance is the second moment about the mean and nothing to do with 9.

So there is a proper answer, and maybe there is a single word that conveys it. I find it curious that Singularity says the answer was obvious to him because "he thinks in pictures", because I too have a very geometrical way of thinking yet for me it is very much a case of the wording of the question obfuscating what it is asking (ie a badly asked question) ... I think we would have all got it immediately if the question had been phrased like this:

[jimbunyard]

Originally Posted by Singularity

.....Aristotle was a BS artist and solipsist; accordingly, Aristotle's version of "logic" is imaginary...and using it unplugs the thinker's mind from the world. When this happens...people use words like "meaning" and "reason" without actually 'thinking literally' or 'visualizing' what the hell they are saying. It predisposes people to be herded. It's a thought handicap of the highest order. And Western civilization thought/communication is based on this.

But what do I know...you didn't recognize a simple physics or statistics problem when it was shown to you because you need it to be shown to you as a physics problem. The universe is filled with these patterns...logos as Heraclitus would say (synchronicity in ~Eastern philosophy). You can't make a horse want to see the overlap of the patterns, but it bears mentioning that the human's visual pattern-recognition cognitive circuit is much, much older than the written/verbal communicative circuit. Hence, skepticism, etc ad nauseam.

FWIW I'm no fan of philosophy...it's most word games invented by people who do not think with pictures. But solipsism is important to understand as it is a disposition heavily associated with sociopathy, at least in the modern world.

Not sure who's the bigger "BS artist" here, but this quote from the man himself hardly typifies one who beliefs only his own mind exists.


"Once you have surveyed our work, if it seems to you that our system has developed adequately in comparison with other treatments arising from the tradition to date—bearing in mind how things were at the beginning of our inquiry—it falls to you, our students, to be indulgent with respect to any omissions in our system, and to feel a great debt of gratitude for the discoveries it contains."


Most people know what (their) definitions of 'meaning and reason' are and use them accordingly. What preisposes them 'to be herded' is the misconception that their definition is the same as everyone else's. Or perhaps laziness. This hardly qualifies as solipsism. 'Western civilization' is certainly responsible for many things that, on reflection, are (currently) percieved as sins, but Aristotle's introduction of one form of systematized logic is not among them.

So far, I've seen no satisfactory (to me) answer to your supposed visual/verbal/non-mathematic 'physics' problem, but I've not been following it very closely once it seemed apparent we were being led 'down the garden path' by a somewhat histrionic sophistry.

It seems you've failed to realize that "the human's visual pattern-recognition cognitive circuit [being] much, much older than the written/verbal communicative circuit" is something of a moot point, because the "written/verbal communicative circuit" is an integral part of the "vpr cognitive circuit".

Leaving aside the anthropocentric (or is that homocentric?) hubris and arrogance displayed by the assumption that the operation of the "vpr cognitive circuit" of, say, mantis shrimp, theropod dinosaurs, eusocial arthropods or even pre-sapiens homos in any way resembles that of 'modern' humans.

FWIW, even though you're no 'fan' of philosophy, many others recognize its validity, usefulness and importance in understanding the world. After all, it describes, poorly or not, the very thing that makes us human, and is among the first things displayed when newborns are transitioning from animal to human.

Seems to me you're confusing 'narcissism' with 'solipsism', but who cares cuz you don't really exist anyway...

[Singularity]

Originally Posted by Kelkara

...I think we would have all got it immediately if the question had been phrased like this:

I agree, but the teaching point is that we don't have this benefit in real life...and as individuals if we don't learn to formulate things on our own...to develop intuition...then we're both:
a) more likely to make poor decisions (aka "draw" bad conclusions in our head)
b) more susceptible to mesermization/brainwashing. The 1,14,15 question is a mesmerizing/brainwashing question; it induces cognitive dissonance.

This is the thing:
-Way up thread, this question was posed in an ordinary, everyday context as a verbal question [nevertheless the numbers were spelled on on the post]. In other words, in real life we don't have the benefit of people phrasing everything for us in the easiest-to-digest manner.*

-Couple the first point above with the observation that people process 50,000-75,000 discrete thoughts per day AND the fact that tossing out curious combinations of numbers...and you discover how people are prone to making many, many erroneous decisions regarding their own health/safety/economic security, not to mention that of their family and community. This is a deeply profound insight into the human condition that every human ought to know about...because...

*In fact a skilled author/orator can make communication easy to digest precisely to lead the reader/listerner on. If the leader is benevolent and correct...no harm, no foul. If the leader is malicious or incorrect, then the follower effectively is a lemming. Reference current affairs with Covid, how people "debate" on the subject of how to respond. We quite literally have people with poor counting (aka reasoning) skills clogging bandwidth with real-world increased death consequences, not to mention economic consequences.

[Brian Renwick]

See? I told you old white men know everything. Or, at least, they think they do....

[Buzzman]

Well, I'm with StuM on the whole Singularity issue. It reminded me of the graffito on the Waverton railway overpass "Binfield for Bankers"....not sure why....

As to the quizzes, I got 11 in the first and 34 in the second.

Although I have 7/8ths of a degree (and no, I have no idea how to calculate that...) I had zero math and zero science in my Arts-based, some demography degree.

So anything that related to science or math I struggled with, but was able to get some by reduction/deduction, as I am overly curious and reasonably well-read.

Lavoisier I googled. Recalled he was famous around time of French Revolution, but thought chemistry, and none of the options thus made sense.

So, for me, one aspect of so-called trivia quizzes is to learn that which I did not know before. Lavoisier. Conservation of mass. Tick..!

But I agree with the poster who complained about which celeb/sports star/TV star did what at some point in time, as I am not interested in either celebrity or sports, other than incidentally, so am usually crap at those. The real trick, I've found, is finding someone who IS versed in that type of trivia to add to your 'trivia team' who is not otherwise awful company. [What, me? Judgemental..??]

And, ftr, I am just quietly rather enjoying the fact there is little or no sport currently filling the major time slots on TV but, truth be told, it's now making it harder to decide what to watch as - occasionally, unlike in the past 'normal' times - there are often two things on simultaneously that I would like to watch.

Thank the digital gods for catch-up TV....