[HN Gopher] The Patterns of Reality
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       The Patterns of Reality
        
       Author : prismatic
       Score  : 30 points
       Date   : 2023-11-16 20:22 UTC (2 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (aeon.co)
 (TXT) w3m dump (aeon.co)
        
       | dexwiz wrote:
       | Good read but the claim Turning invented the computer prevented
       | me from believing anything that followed. Did he help develop
       | them? Yes, but he was not the sole or even first inventor.
        
       | xg15 wrote:
       | I think the example at the beginning is an interesting one,
       | because it already shows the difference between pure traditional
       | logic and colloquial use of language along with the fuzzyness of
       | real-world problems.
       | 
       | When someone says "Maria is either at home or in the office" they
       | usually don't mean that she can _literally_ only be at those two
       | locations at any time - even a terminal workaholic loner would go
       | for a coffee occasionally and would spend some time commuting
       | from and to that office.
       | 
       | Yet on to apply the strict logical reasoning the rest of the
       | article uses, you'd need that exact kind of literal
       | interpretation where you can conclude that if she's not at home,
       | she must be in the office.
       | 
       | In reality, when someone says "she's either at home or in the
       | office" what they mean is that the probability she's at any of
       | those two locations is vastly greater than the probability she's
       | at some other place.
       | 
       | I think this is why today we're doing more formal reasoning in
       | terms of probability than in "pure" logical statements, because
       | it lets you capture those kinds of fuzzyness much better.
        
       | quantum_state wrote:
       | There is much new in the article .. what it talked about was
       | known long ago ...
        
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       (page generated 2023-11-18 23:01 UTC)