Infinity and our Existence

[devonin]

Bear in mind here, I'm no mathemetician by any stretch, I just associate with plenty, and the best answer I have to your objection is, as regards what I described (being the Generalised Continuum Hypothesis, which you linked to above) is that Paul Cohen's proofs in 1963 either proved or disproved it depending on your particular views of set theory. Obviously my mathy friends and yourself have differing views thereto.

[aperson]

Originally Posted by devonin

Bear in mind here, I'm no mathemetician by any stretch, I just associate with plenty, and the best answer I have to your objection is, as regards what I described (being the Generalised Continuum Hypothesis, which you linked to above) is that Jack Cohen's proofs in 1963 either proved or disproved it depending on your particular views of set theory. Obviously my mathy friends and yourself have differing views thereto.

I'm aware that GCH is indepent of ZFC, but has ramifications to the implications of AC. However, nothing from the Continuum Hypothesis has anything to do with your post. Both domains you listed have exactly the same size and you can use the tools I linked to in my above post to figure out why. There is no objection here, you are wrong and there is no undecidability involved here.

[devonin]

Devonin: All I really wanted to know was "Did I go into a discussion about the theory of evolution, and present lamarckism as though it were fact"

Mathy Friend: The hammer description might be the right one
(He had previously referred to what I did as "Using GCH as a hammer"

Devonin: I took a somewhat useful, somewhat not useful example, and presented it as though it were fact in all cases?

Mathy Friend: You used a true fact to support an incorrect claim, which was only very vaguely related to the fact.

Devonin: So my claim was actually just flat incorrect then?

Mathy Friend: What I am trying to explain is why your claim was not correct with respect to the commonly accepted reasoning.

Whereupon followed the surprisingly patient attempts to explain injection and bijective mapping to a philosophy and history major, and I can see where what I said would seem potentially outright daft to a mathematician, for which I apologise. But you have to admit that from an informal logic (Or really, any non-math standpoint) it really makes -no- sense to say "Set A is the same size as Set B, which contains Set A and other things"

This is clearly a case of my reading about math in terms that were too dumbed down to make me realise that the operational approach I'm accustomed to simply wasn't up to the task of looking at such subject matter.

Thank you for encouraging me to seek more educated council on the subject.

[aperson]

Well one of the most basic definitions of an infinite set is that if Set A is infinite then A is a proper subset of A.

Things get haywire and counterintuitive quickly with infinite sets, which is why a layperson shouldn't start messing with the stuff without building up a proper background.

[devonin]

The particular mathematician I was speaking with was perfectly happy to explain, on the grounds that "It is valuable to explain things that seem to defy common sense" So he was right there with me that the point of view I was suggesting made a lot of sense outside the bounds of math.

[jewpinthethird]

Originally Posted by aperson

Well one of the most basic definitions of an infinite set is that if Set A is infinite then A is a proper subset of A.

Things get haywire and counterintuitive quickly with infinite sets, which is why a layperson shouldn't start messing with the stuff without building up a proper background.

OH GOD, THE INFINITY...IT'S GOING HAYWIRE. WHAT DO WE DO?

[Kilroy_x]

Recombulate the Linuxes; we're going to have to do this the old fashioned way.

[devonin]

Are you boys cooking up there?
Are you building an interociter up there?

Edit: Hot Damn, 1000th post was a MST3k reference!

[rebelrunner26]

ok, first of all...denovin, aperson, i take my hat off to you two.
second...how do you know all of this stuff, because i'd very much like to learn as well
thirdly...this thread went a bit downhill very quickly

[devonin]

First: Thanks
Second: I read a lot, and when I get to something I don't understand, I find someone who does and make them explain until I do understand
Third: Jewpin tends to make that happen

[Relambrien]

Originally Posted by devonin

Third: Jewpin tends to make that happen

I think it started here:

Originally Posted by jewpinthethird

OH GOD, THE INFINITY...IT'S GOING HAYWIRE. WHAT DO WE DO?

[blu3fiend]

i think that although we try to understand infinity we can never understand it as long as we are bound to a certain amount of time

[devonin]

I thought we were agreed to lock this trainwreck.

[dcflipkid]

Even if alien life is out there what is probability of those liforms to colide with the human race and if so would these lifeforms have evolved to our lntellect

[devonin]

if they went out into space looking for other things, they are assuredly past the level of our intellect. Humanity has far too high an opinion of itself.

[Kilgamayan]

Originally Posted by devonin

Humanity has far too high an opinion of itself.

Welcome to Critical Thinking.

[Magic_V2]

To assume that the universe is infinite contradicts the theory that the universe is expanding. True or false?

[Kilroy_x]

False. There can be an infinite number of components and still be an increase in distance between individuals.

[aperson]

Originally Posted by Kilroy_x

False. There can be an infinite number of components and still be an increase in distance between individuals.

That doesn't disprove his claim but you're really dense so I won't get into the details

[Kilroy_x]

I must have pissed you off pretty good. So let's hear it. Based on your attitude so far I can't imagine you would pass up this good of a chance to show off your relative intelligence, especially relative to me.