you tryna start a Beef with me or somethin :p
trust me, i’m all game, but you know my knife-fighting policy
Conversation
i thought of a fun way for us to Beef without knives.
a TV show debate; i recommend you a show, you recommend me a show; whoever learns something, loses
game?
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What are you, a Ben Shapiro? 😂
There’s nothing to debate. You’re not interested in math, I’m not interested in converting anyone to math appreciation.
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*shrug* just bored and wanna play some games
i keep forgetting that all you Employed types have better things to do with your time lol. fair enough.
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sorry, i’ll stop haranguing you if it’s actually annoying.
dunno why i’m interested in beefing with you, really. you’ve occupied a good portion of my headspace for like 15 years now. maybe it’s some sort of cosmic justice
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You just laid out the best case for math investment. Math is the best way to occupy your own headspace and prevent that kind of Straussian pwnage by other minds 🙂
Even famous mathematicians can’t occupy your head because to understand what they did you have to redo it yourself
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i just got finished scrubbing my head of reigious thinking (on your advice!), and now you’re telling me it’s good again?
sigh
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I think a crux issue between math and organized religion is rhetoric strategies.
In organized religion you typically appeal to faith or authority (zen etc. notwithstanding)
In math you're on your own to derive Truth yourself, but there's others who went on the journey before u
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Crucially, in the latter, it’s easy to fool yourself that you’re being persuaded by “logic” when in fact you’re being persuaded by charismatic authority. The main value of math is that it’s easier to do the actual work than to fool yourself that you get it when you don’t.
I never took Intro to Proofs in undergrad so I tend to hedge epistemically that I'm delusional.
I think what makes me and many others an "engineer" is we need a constructive proof that we know something, and making something is typically am effective demonstration of knowledge.
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I’m naturally sympathetic to that too. You might like Brouwer’s intiitionistic math (which despite the name is more rigorous, not less). Non-constructive proofs are illegal in it. Proved too difficult for me, but I intend to take another run at in retirement.
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you have yet to give me a single plain english answer as to why i should give a shit about math or what possible good it could do in mine or anyone’s lives
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