Philosophers will argue that all evidence, either for or against, and no matter how concrete or arguably irrefutable, is suspect and may not be absolutely trusted; human error and similar conditions alone provide all the support they need to make this case.
Not necessarily true. Not all philosophers are so skeptical, and a good philosopher will probably first ask, what does it mean to prove something? Some philosophers are more inclined to value abstract logical concepts, while others prefer sensory information. Being a philosopher doesn't give you any particular opinion.
Paraphrasing Richard Carrier [infidels.org]: Difficulty in disproving a negative is not the negativity of it, it is the breadth of the assertion which makes it difficult ("There are no martians" means we have to search the entire universe quickly enough that a martian could not move into a previously observed area during the span of the observation).
Also in limits to our ability to measure and observe, and limits in our ability to imagine. In order to say, "there are no alien signals being broadcast toward earth," not only does it require that you're measuring signals coming from every direction all the time, but you have to ask other questions: What if our machinery isn't sensitive enough? What if we're not measuring the right things? Perhaps most devastating of all: what if the signal was in a form that we aren't even able to think of? Someone recently suggested that aliens might send signals using neutrinos (I think it was neutrinos) rather than radio waves. But what if the most natural and best method that aliens think of to send signals is something that is so exotic that, due to limits of our understanding, we are inherently incapable of understanding?
The fact is that proofs in general have some kind of constraint that involves defining what a "proof" is. If you constrain the situation such that you use, "If there is an elephant, then I will see him," as one of your premises, then "I see no elephant," should be enough to claim that you've developed an air-tight proof.
The main part of the problem with proving a negative is that reality gets hard to constrain in that way, and people have a tendency to move the goalposts when trying to prove a negative. If you claim there's an elephant in my backyard, and I walk out and say, "I see no elephant," you might say, "he's invisible". My belief then doesn't rely on anything inside a constrained proof, but rather my general disbelief at the concept of invisible elephants (which I can't prove don't exist). There can't really be a set of conditions agreed upon ahead of time of what it means to not-exist, and then present evidence of invisible elephants to show that they are part of that set of things which don't exist.
On the other hand, if I say there is an elephant in my back yard, we can agree ahead of time on some criteria on what qualities existing things must have, and then I can proceed to show evidence that the elephant has those qualities.
Even in your example of the elephant in your back yard, you strictly aren't proving the lack of elephants in your back yard. What I mean is, in a very technical sense, you can't offer any positive evidence of no-elephants in your back yard. What you're offering is a lack of evidence for an elephant in your back yard. You're saying, "I don't have visual evidence of an elephant in my backyard, and if there's an elephant there I should be able to see it."
And yes, that's very compelling. Some things should give very direct evidence of their existence, and so if that evidence is lacking, it's a strong indication that they don't exist. In that case, a lack of evidence can be sufficient to be satisfying, but it's not exactly a positive proof. At best, it's a reductio ad absurdum. In math, it's easy enough to reduce to absurdity, but in life, which often is absurd, the process is less certain.
OK, now prove that there were no elephants in your back yard yesterday.
What you're saying is that if Apple tested every one of their machines in existence, they could say that none of them are currently giving off toxic fumes. Then the people claiming that their machines were giving off toxic fumes can just say, "well it has stopped now," or "maybe it's giving off a toxic fume that you aren't testing for" or something else. So in that case, all Apple would be able to say is that they have no evidence that any of their machines are currently giving off toxic fumes in a significant enough quantity to be detected by their test.
I think the grandparent's post is that it's as strong a denial as can reasonably be made. You can never really prove a negative. If you told me an invisible purple unicorn lives in my backyard, then, being entirely strict, I can't really prove that there isn't. The most I can really do is challenge you to provide some kind of evidence that there is.
In that kind of sense, if someone says there are toxic fumes coming out of a certain brand of computers, then the most the vendor can claim is that they've found no evidence to support that. They can't really prove that none of their computers have ever given off any toxic fumes. If they had a time machine, they could go back in time to when the particular computer was said to have given off toxic fumes, test those fumes, and state more conclusively whether those fumes were toxic. However, even then it wouldn't allow them to say they'd proven that none of their computers had ever given off any toxic fumes.
So yes, that they "found no evidence" is the strongest thing they can claim. And it seems like no one else found any evidence either. If this problem is serious and widespread, then someone should be able to provide some kind of evidence. Until someone does, I'm going to file this away with the invisible purple unicorn as "unfounded".
Me too. I get really annoyed wehn people seem to respond half-assed to my comments, and then it doesn't make sense because it doesn't even seem like they're responding to my post or even that they read my post and it doesn't make a lot of sense either. It's I'm all liek, didn't you even read my post? Did you even read your own post?
I absolutely love working with GIMP, but the fonts still don't come out as nice as they do in Photoshop. I'm not graphical design savvy enough to know why, only that my fonts look like crud when compared to the smooth output of Photoshop.
Could it be the kerning? I don't use GIMP, but kerning is one of those things that can be hard to put your finger on, but make a huge difference on whether or not text looks good.
Sure, don't worry *too much* about your kids seeing a penis one time by accident. That stuff happens. The internet didn't invent children being exposed to things like that.
As you mention, getting a burn on the stove isn't going to kill them. Still, that doesn't mean it's smart to put your toddler on the stove next to the red hot burner. There's being over protective, there's being appropriately relaxed, and then there's stupidly putting your child in inappropriate/dangerous situations.
Re:What the problem with Gmail?
on
Good Email For Kids?
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· Score: 4, Insightful
I think any e-mail solution for kids should be done with whitelisting. Not just for filtering out spam, but because there's no reason that anyone you don't know should be e-mailing your kids.
That assumes that the intended target is "pirates". With all the DRM and "product activation" out there, those things have only ever been successful at 2 things:
Preventing casual sharing
Forcing people to buy multiple copies of the same content
At this point, I'm running under the assumption that those are the things these companies intend to stop with their DRM.
I was saying that it sounded like they were using some kind of DRM and Hyppy sounded like he was disagreeing by saying, "That doesn't matter, because I can still get it one way or the other."
So I was just trying to say that, if that's disagreeing with what I'm saying, then DRM isn't a concern at all (which I don't think is true).
If you think DRM is a concern at all, than Hyppy's post isn't very relevant.
... buy music, download it to my unencumbered computer system using open source software I compiled myself, play it directly using open source software I compiled myself, or transfer it to my portable player (and have it play there) using open source software I compiled myself... then it's truly DRM free.
Does Amazon's store not count? I guess not, because they have a client for downloading albums, but I thought at least singles could be downloaded using only a web browser. But this "MySpace service" is actually just pointing you to Amazon.
I don't know. I still use iTunes. The client doesn't have open source, but as long as you stick to their "iTunes Plus" selection, the files themselves are completely DRM-free. I've not yet been in the situation where something I wanted to buy was unavailable in iTunes Plus but available on Amazon. Really just a coincidence, but when that day comes, I'll try Amazon.
The catch: the music can be played only on personal computers connected to the Internet and listeners have to tolerate advertising splashed across the screen.
So it sounds like MySpace has made a listening service that allows you to listen to music, but probably has something resembling DRM to keep you from keeping it, listening to it offline, or putting it on portable players.
If you actually want to *buy* the music and keep it without DRM, it shuffles you off to Amazon. Amazon, of course, offers a pretty good DRM-free MP3 store.
Unlike much of the material at Apple's iTunes store, the music sold through MySpace's new service won't contain the protections that limit how many times a track can be copied.
Which is kind of misunderstanding the issue. iTunes doesn't control how many times a track can be copied, but rather how many devices are authorized to play it. But anyway...
MySpace appears to be in a better position to take on iTunes because its site has always emphasized music.
Weird comments like this are peppered throughout the article. Sounds like someone has beef. The author of the article (like the author of the summary) seem hellbent on painting this as an iTunes killer. However:
Despite its musical bent, MySpace isn't positioning its service as an iTunes killer. "We see this as more of a complement to what Apple is doing and create even more demand for digital music devices,"
In many cases trying to deal with an IT department is just one big PITA
Usually that's either because your IT department should be fired or because you're asking for something that you shouldn't be asking for. I can't really tell you which without knowing more. (I'm not saying I want to know more)
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Philosophers will argue that all evidence, either for or against, and no matter how concrete or arguably irrefutable, is suspect and may not be absolutely trusted; human error and similar conditions alone provide all the support they need to make this case.
Not necessarily true. Not all philosophers are so skeptical, and a good philosopher will probably first ask, what does it mean to prove something? Some philosophers are more inclined to value abstract logical concepts, while others prefer sensory information. Being a philosopher doesn't give you any particular opinion.
Paraphrasing Richard Carrier [infidels.org]: Difficulty in disproving a negative is not the negativity of it, it is the breadth of the assertion which makes it difficult ("There are no martians" means we have to search the entire universe quickly enough that a martian could not move into a previously observed area during the span of the observation).
Also in limits to our ability to measure and observe, and limits in our ability to imagine. In order to say, "there are no alien signals being broadcast toward earth," not only does it require that you're measuring signals coming from every direction all the time, but you have to ask other questions: What if our machinery isn't sensitive enough? What if we're not measuring the right things? Perhaps most devastating of all: what if the signal was in a form that we aren't even able to think of? Someone recently suggested that aliens might send signals using neutrinos (I think it was neutrinos) rather than radio waves. But what if the most natural and best method that aliens think of to send signals is something that is so exotic that, due to limits of our understanding, we are inherently incapable of understanding?
The fact is that proofs in general have some kind of constraint that involves defining what a "proof" is. If you constrain the situation such that you use, "If there is an elephant, then I will see him," as one of your premises, then "I see no elephant," should be enough to claim that you've developed an air-tight proof.
The main part of the problem with proving a negative is that reality gets hard to constrain in that way, and people have a tendency to move the goalposts when trying to prove a negative. If you claim there's an elephant in my backyard, and I walk out and say, "I see no elephant," you might say, "he's invisible". My belief then doesn't rely on anything inside a constrained proof, but rather my general disbelief at the concept of invisible elephants (which I can't prove don't exist). There can't really be a set of conditions agreed upon ahead of time of what it means to not-exist, and then present evidence of invisible elephants to show that they are part of that set of things which don't exist.
On the other hand, if I say there is an elephant in my back yard, we can agree ahead of time on some criteria on what qualities existing things must have, and then I can proceed to show evidence that the elephant has those qualities.
Sorry to ramble a bit.
Even in your example of the elephant in your back yard, you strictly aren't proving the lack of elephants in your back yard. What I mean is, in a very technical sense, you can't offer any positive evidence of no-elephants in your back yard. What you're offering is a lack of evidence for an elephant in your back yard. You're saying, "I don't have visual evidence of an elephant in my backyard, and if there's an elephant there I should be able to see it."
And yes, that's very compelling. Some things should give very direct evidence of their existence, and so if that evidence is lacking, it's a strong indication that they don't exist. In that case, a lack of evidence can be sufficient to be satisfying, but it's not exactly a positive proof. At best, it's a reductio ad absurdum. In math, it's easy enough to reduce to absurdity, but in life, which often is absurd, the process is less certain.
It was gross enough when it was just a tiny little cup. If you expect two girls to fill a whole spaceship, those are going to be some big girls.
Universal has already tried dropping iTunes as a video distribution method. It didn't seem to stick.
OK, now prove that there were no elephants in your back yard yesterday.
What you're saying is that if Apple tested every one of their machines in existence, they could say that none of them are currently giving off toxic fumes. Then the people claiming that their machines were giving off toxic fumes can just say, "well it has stopped now," or "maybe it's giving off a toxic fume that you aren't testing for" or something else. So in that case, all Apple would be able to say is that they have no evidence that any of their machines are currently giving off toxic fumes in a significant enough quantity to be detected by their test.
I think the grandparent's post is that it's as strong a denial as can reasonably be made. You can never really prove a negative. If you told me an invisible purple unicorn lives in my backyard, then, being entirely strict, I can't really prove that there isn't. The most I can really do is challenge you to provide some kind of evidence that there is.
In that kind of sense, if someone says there are toxic fumes coming out of a certain brand of computers, then the most the vendor can claim is that they've found no evidence to support that. They can't really prove that none of their computers have ever given off any toxic fumes. If they had a time machine, they could go back in time to when the particular computer was said to have given off toxic fumes, test those fumes, and state more conclusively whether those fumes were toxic. However, even then it wouldn't allow them to say they'd proven that none of their computers had ever given off any toxic fumes.
So yes, that they "found no evidence" is the strongest thing they can claim. And it seems like no one else found any evidence either. If this problem is serious and widespread, then someone should be able to provide some kind of evidence. Until someone does, I'm going to file this away with the invisible purple unicorn as "unfounded".
Me too. I get really annoyed wehn people seem to respond half-assed to my comments, and then it doesn't make sense because it doesn't even seem like they're responding to my post or even that they read my post and it doesn't make a lot of sense either. It's I'm all liek, didn't you even read my post? Did you even read your own post?
I don't think people even read their own posts.
I'm sorry, what were we talking about? I don't even pay attention to my own comments.
You don't have to tell us. Nobody here reads the articles or the summaries. Hell, we barely read the comments they're responding to.
I absolutely love working with GIMP, but the fonts still don't come out as nice as they do in Photoshop. I'm not graphical design savvy enough to know why, only that my fonts look like crud when compared to the smooth output of Photoshop.
Could it be the kerning? I don't use GIMP, but kerning is one of those things that can be hard to put your finger on, but make a huge difference on whether or not text looks good.
Imagine a 10.0.0.0/8 wifi network covering a neighborhood and sharing the big popular downloads among themselves.
Great idea. Quick question: how will that wifi network connect to the Internet?
The question I have is, did they use this method to discover that there was "whitespace" in this area of patents before deciding to try to patent it?
Sure, don't worry *too much* about your kids seeing a penis one time by accident. That stuff happens. The internet didn't invent children being exposed to things like that.
As you mention, getting a burn on the stove isn't going to kill them. Still, that doesn't mean it's smart to put your toddler on the stove next to the red hot burner. There's being over protective, there's being appropriately relaxed, and then there's stupidly putting your child in inappropriate/dangerous situations.
I think any e-mail solution for kids should be done with whitelisting. Not just for filtering out spam, but because there's no reason that anyone you don't know should be e-mailing your kids.
That assumes that the intended target is "pirates". With all the DRM and "product activation" out there, those things have only ever been successful at 2 things:
At this point, I'm running under the assumption that those are the things these companies intend to stop with their DRM.
I was saying that it sounded like they were using some kind of DRM and Hyppy sounded like he was disagreeing by saying, "That doesn't matter, because I can still get it one way or the other."
So I was just trying to say that, if that's disagreeing with what I'm saying, then DRM isn't a concern at all (which I don't think is true).
If you think DRM is a concern at all, than Hyppy's post isn't very relevant.
Well by that logic, there is no such thing as DRM.
... buy music, download it to my unencumbered computer system using open source software I compiled myself, play it directly using open source software I compiled myself, or transfer it to my portable player (and have it play there) using open source software I compiled myself ... then it's truly DRM free.
Does Amazon's store not count? I guess not, because they have a client for downloading albums, but I thought at least singles could be downloaded using only a web browser. But this "MySpace service" is actually just pointing you to Amazon.
I don't know. I still use iTunes. The client doesn't have open source, but as long as you stick to their "iTunes Plus" selection, the files themselves are completely DRM-free. I've not yet been in the situation where something I wanted to buy was unavailable in iTunes Plus but available on Amazon. Really just a coincidence, but when that day comes, I'll try Amazon.
The catch: the music can be played only on personal computers connected to the Internet and listeners have to tolerate advertising splashed across the screen.
So it sounds like MySpace has made a listening service that allows you to listen to music, but probably has something resembling DRM to keep you from keeping it, listening to it offline, or putting it on portable players.
If you actually want to *buy* the music and keep it without DRM, it shuffles you off to Amazon. Amazon, of course, offers a pretty good DRM-free MP3 store.
Unlike much of the material at Apple's iTunes store, the music sold through MySpace's new service won't contain the protections that limit how many times a track can be copied.
Which is kind of misunderstanding the issue. iTunes doesn't control how many times a track can be copied, but rather how many devices are authorized to play it. But anyway...
MySpace appears to be in a better position to take on iTunes because its site has always emphasized music.
Weird comments like this are peppered throughout the article. Sounds like someone has beef. The author of the article (like the author of the summary) seem hellbent on painting this as an iTunes killer. However:
Despite its musical bent, MySpace isn't positioning its service as an iTunes killer. "We see this as more of a complement to what Apple is doing and create even more demand for digital music devices,"
In many cases trying to deal with an IT department is just one big PITA
Usually that's either because your IT department should be fired or because you're asking for something that you shouldn't be asking for. I can't really tell you which without knowing more. (I'm not saying I want to know more)
"You want iLife with that?" was a question. If you don't want it, then it's not $80 more.
With all the horrible things on the Internet, you're worried about rickrolls? Have some priorities.
We're all going to end up seeing goatse.cx again.
You want iLife with that? $80 more.
And what if they say, "It looked like a square-headed cartoon guy wearing a wig"? How long will it take you to figure out what that person means?
Unfortunately, my experience suggests it would go something like this:
Me: "What did you click on to open it?"
"The little thing."
Me: "What little thing?"
"Um... I mean, it's little, and it's on your desktop, and you kind of move it around...?"
Me: "I have no idea what you're talking about."
"It's plastic, and you move it around..."
Me: "Do you mean your mouse?"
"Yeah."
Me: "I mean, what icon did you click on?"
-blank stare-
Me: "The icon?"
-blank stare-
-I return the blank stare-
"An icon?"
Me: "Yeah, you know, like the little squarish picture that you click on to run a program?"
"I don't think my computer has anything like that. It's new. I think it runs Vista..."
And then I'd just have to continue on where I said, "Umm... Ok, whatever. Does it give you any kind of error message when you try to get your e-mail?"
Sometimes continuing to ask questions just gets you in deeper.
But if you want to buy the full version of Creative Suite that includes Premier and everything, you're paying $2500.
Since when does anyone *buy* Adobe Creative Suite?
I'm joking, of course. Sort of.