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Wednesday, March 1, 2017
Good tweet
From Taleb:
BTW I never say that mathematicians think in "numbers" but in axioms, objects, and inequalities: pic.twitter.com/ov57yBnS4v
Are there experts that can help us identify pseudo-experts?
A couple of excerpts from the interview:
"The only way to judge a book is by something called the Lindy effect, and that is its survival. My books have survived."
What the heck is he talking about? The Black Swan is not even 10 years old. Survived my handsome Greek looks. My Bauer hockey skates have survived longer than his book!
And then there is this beauty:
"[Obama] didn’t fix the economic system, he put novocaine [local anaesthetic] in the system. He delayed the problem by working with the bankers whom he should have prosecuted. And now we have double the deficit, adjusted for GDP, to create six million jobs, with a massive debt and the system isn’t cured. We retained zero interest rates, and that hasn’t helped. Basically we shifted the problem from the private corporates to the government in the U.S. So, the system remains very fragile."
Me thinks Taleb is sounding a little fragile there himself :(
I myself was wondering how did Taleb think this paragraph:
The problem of the verbalistic (and the journalistic) is expressed in an aphorism earlier in the Incerto: mathematicians think in axioms, applied mathematicians in limits, probabilists in inequalities, philosophers in concepts, jurists in constructs, logicians in operators (...), and journalists and other idiots in words.
Did he think that in formal axioms, limits, inequalities, operators? Is that a meta-mathematical or meta-logical theorem, you know, with a formal proof?
Why did he translate that into, you know, words?
How does one formulate concepts, constructs without words? Grunts? Howls? Whistles?
Words are symbols for concepts, and philosophy has a lot to do with analyzing concepts. The meaning of key concepts is generally far from clear and there are a lot presumptions and hidden assumptions involved in them.
Logicians think in terms of operators, which are syntactical rules for linking concepts coherently and semantic rules for connecting concepts with facts and events. Logic is a prerequisite for doing philosophy.
Mathematicians can be viewed as a subset of logicians since they also focus on syntactical rules for linking symbols.
Science is a subset of philosophy that emphasizes the logic of description and the use of math to deal with quantities precisely. Science is characterized by measurement, e.g., parameters relate to measurement and determine scope and scale conditions.
In a broad sense, philosophy is involved in reflecting rigorously on "fundamentals." Fundamentals are determined by context. Fundamentals determine the framework.
Jurists deal in constructed in that positive law is socially constructed and carefully crafted by legislators to convey their intent in formulating it. So lawyers argue over the facts of a case and the way the law as a social constructed should be interpreted regarding it.
Morons use words like they have some sort of magical meaning that conveys exactly what they mean and conforms to their cognitive-affective representation of reality in which their attitude toward it is embedded. It is naïve and usually rote rather than reflective and examined.
Morons use words like they have some sort of magical meaning that conveys exactly what they mean and conforms to their cognitive-affective representation of reality in which their attitude toward it is embedded
This is called "magical thinking."
The antidote to it is rigor but not reductionism.
The challenge is to navigate safely between the Scylla of magical thinking and the Charybdis of reductionism.
"There's A Global Riot Against Pseudo-Experts"
ReplyDeleteAre there experts that can help us identify pseudo-experts?
A couple of excerpts from the interview:
"The only way to judge a book is by something called the Lindy effect, and that is its survival. My books have survived."
What the heck is he talking about? The Black Swan is not even 10 years old. Survived my handsome Greek looks. My Bauer hockey skates have survived longer than his book!
And then there is this beauty:
"[Obama] didn’t fix the economic system, he put novocaine [local anaesthetic] in the system. He delayed the problem by working with the bankers whom he should have prosecuted. And now we have double the deficit, adjusted for GDP, to create six million jobs, with a massive debt and the system isn’t cured. We retained zero interest rates, and that hasn’t helped. Basically we shifted the problem from the private corporates to the government in the U.S. So, the system remains very fragile."
Me thinks Taleb is sounding a little fragile there himself :(
@lastgreek
ReplyDeleteI myself was wondering how did Taleb think this paragraph:
The problem of the verbalistic (and the journalistic) is expressed in an aphorism earlier in the Incerto: mathematicians think in axioms, applied mathematicians in limits, probabilists in inequalities, philosophers in concepts, jurists in constructs, logicians in operators (...), and journalists and other idiots in words.
Did he think that in formal axioms, limits, inequalities, operators? Is that a meta-mathematical or meta-logical theorem, you know, with a formal proof?
Why did he translate that into, you know, words?
How does one formulate concepts, constructs without words? Grunts? Howls? Whistles?
Bizarre.
Seagulls formulate concepts by taking a dump on someone's big bald head...
ReplyDeleteMag, he is talking about the thought process...
ReplyDeleteIt comes as a result of how the person is trained...
Here are some words: "we're out of money!", "inflation is always a monetary issue!", "we're borrowin' from our grandchildren!" etc...
By 'words' he means they think by referring to phrases they learned via rote methodology...
How do you get out of a rote falsehood? Like if you learned via rote "we're out of money!", how does one overcome that falsehood?
You have to be able to apply one of those other mathematical methodologies...
What we are up against is a problem with cognition...
greek,
ReplyDeleteHe is a stochastic person so he looks at everything as a probability...
So he is not going to understand deterministic functions... not his bag...
But his larger point about how these morons can only rely on rote statements of words is still insightful...
Philosophers-concepts
ReplyDeletelogicians - operators
jurists - constructs
morons -words
is actually a good summation.
Words are symbols for concepts, and philosophy has a lot to do with analyzing concepts. The meaning of key concepts is generally far from clear and there are a lot presumptions and hidden assumptions involved in them.
Logicians think in terms of operators, which are syntactical rules for linking concepts coherently and semantic rules for connecting concepts with facts and events. Logic is a prerequisite for doing philosophy.
Mathematicians can be viewed as a subset of logicians since they also focus on syntactical rules for linking symbols.
Science is a subset of philosophy that emphasizes the logic of description and the use of math to deal with quantities precisely. Science is characterized by measurement, e.g., parameters relate to measurement and determine scope and scale conditions.
In a broad sense, philosophy is involved in reflecting rigorously on "fundamentals." Fundamentals are determined by context. Fundamentals determine the framework.
Jurists deal in constructed in that positive law is socially constructed and carefully crafted by legislators to convey their intent in formulating it. So lawyers argue over the facts of a case and the way the law as a social constructed should be interpreted regarding it.
Morons use words like they have some sort of magical meaning that conveys exactly what they mean and conforms to their cognitive-affective representation of reality in which their attitude toward it is embedded. It is naïve and usually rote rather than reflective and examined.
Morons use words like they have some sort of magical meaning that conveys exactly what they mean and conforms to their cognitive-affective representation of reality in which their attitude toward it is embedded
ReplyDeleteThis is called "magical thinking."
The antidote to it is rigor but not reductionism.
The challenge is to navigate safely between the Scylla of magical thinking and the Charybdis of reductionism.
There is a middle ground.
He [Taleb] is a stochastic person
ReplyDeleteOne can tell that: the links in his chain of thought are stochastically arranged. :-)