RAND AND THE APPARENT LIMITATIONS OF FORMAL LOGIC

Some time on Facebook I ago I made some meager contribution to a discussion on Ayn Rand's fiction writing style. As such, any discussion on her philosophy per se was of secondary relevance to the main topic. It did, however, get me wondering about how she would have felt about Kurt Godel's Incompleteness Theorems. It seemed that logic was so integral to her philosophy of objectivism, seeing as she had her uberman John Galt go on about during a 100+ page monologue in "Atlas Shrugged".

I'm not kidding about how long that monologue is.Go and try to read that book if you think I'm pulling your leg.

Now, seeing as how meticulously Rand was in building a logical framework for her ideas and how interested she seemed to be in philosophy in general (and logic and reason specifically), it was natural for me to wonder if what she would have made of Betrand Russell, most notably his attempt to reduce all of mathematics to logic. And with Kurt Godel's Incompleteness Theorem that pretty much proved such a feat was mathematically impossible.  Given that Rand lived until 1982, at which point Russell and Godel's work had been around for nearly 50 years; it seems likely to me that she would have heard something about them.

(Please note that Godel's Incompleteness Theorems seems generally about the limitation of formal logical systems sophisticated enough to cover and accept ordinary arithmetic. It doesn't seem to deal with formal systems that do not deal with ordinary arithmetic and it certainly doesn't seem to pertain to informal logic, the kind that most of us use in the real world anyway).

I haven't yet found much in the way of direct quotes from Rand herself (and to be honest, I'm not sure if I really WANT to read too much more of her after wading through "Atlas Shrugged"). However, it seems that at least one student of Rand have been doing some of the heavy mental lifting as far as that question is concern. In David Ross's "Foundation Study Guide: Philosophy of Mathematics", the author discusses and differentiate a formalist's approach to mathematical logic (which is concerned with the algebraic forms of logical systems without concern for their meanings) and the objectivist's approach to logic (which is concerned with meaning).  I'm only just beginning to look into kind of thing myself but I'm beginning to suspect that my search for answers will eventually lead me to  "The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics in the Natural Sciences" by Eugene Wigner which while obviously based on a scientist's perception, an objectivist's prerequisite stated in Ross's article, would most likely given Ms. Rand one enormously endless hissy fit with the phrase "unreasonable effectiveness" alone.

Yes, I need to get laid.  I know. I know.

The Gothic Creatives and other updates

Okay, this is just a short note to let people know that I've joined the Gothic Creatives, an association of horror and dark fantasy writers administrated by Andrea Dean von Scoyoc. I've long ago decided to stop holding my breath until an agent or a publisher decides to bother with me, so I've banded with other independents to help promote one another.  Over on the right of this page are/will be banners which link interested readers to the websites of other members.  With Halloween coming up, now would probably be a good time to check 'em out.

Moreover, I've decided to spruce up the site with a background similar to the one I used to have over at MySpace.  I hope you likey.

The Gods Must Be High

In "Chaos and Cyber Culture", Timothy Leary related how he liked to write letters to the editors while pretended as best he could to be a conservative and highlight some of the loonier aspects of the far right.  Note that this book came out in 1994, well over a decade before Stephen Colbert.

Just this morning, I checked out Reason's "Hit and Run" blog about Standard and Poor's Downgrading of the United States Government's credit rating and took note of the comments.  Apparently, the tactics seems to be employed by people of various political and philosophical alignment.  Who's progressive, who's conservative, who's just pretending to be on "the other side" (whatever that's supposed to mean) and who really is that plain "nutty" (whatever definition the reader chooses to use)?  As for me, I'm not 100% sure I know and not even 100% sure I care.

Timothy Leary lives, people.




 

New Stories

Okay, I really need to get my writing going so as part of the means to that end, I have managed to get two stories accepted to two magazines.

One is "Jethro's Toxic Assets" which is now part of the June 2011 issue of "Twisted Dreams"

The other story will be in the June issue of Horrotica (and by way, this link leads to the APRIL issue which I am NOT in).

Cheers!

NO THANKS...I'LL JUST WALK TO ALPHA CENTURAI

Okay, I'm not a big Star Trek guy.  There are several episodes of the series (particularly STNG) that I've enjoyed, but when it comes to the intricacies of Trek lore I am not as well-studied as your more diehard Trekkie.  I have, however, slogged my way through a few college physics courses and there are a few aspects that have gotten the little hamster wheel in my brain spinning.  One of these is the system of teleportation portrayed on the show.  From everything I can understand, people and objects getting "beamed" get broken down to the subatomic level to facilitate their being transmitted to a receiver at their destination where a computer--which would require a STUPENDOUSLY TREMENDOUS amount of processing power--would reassemble these people and objects into their original forms.

Well, copies of their original forms, but you know what I mean.  Anyway, for the sake of today's blog, I'm going to assume that those dilithium crystals really are some badass energy sources and that computers will have gotten powerful enough by Star Trek's time.  My question is not so much a technical aspect but a somewhat social aspect that fan fiction writers might want to consider.

The Star Trek mythos or gestalt or whatever term may be more appropriate here requires that if a person is beamed from a particular origin, he/she/it has to be the same person as or near indistinguishable copy of that person upon arrival and reassembly at the destination.  Yeah, I know there have been some really nasty glitches on some episodes and movies, but they were just that--glitches.  Most everyone else comes through more or less as the same person or--to get to my point--with more or less the same identity.

Now, there is currently some debate within certain circles on what makes up someone's personality.  Is it just a particular arrangement of the molecules that make up a particular person's brain?  Something that emerges from activity of neurons?  Some special "other quality" or "spirit" like some dualist would say?  Whatever the case, it seems to me (and I just may be missing something here) that if such a technology as Star Trek's teleportation were to exists this question would likely to have been finally answered beforehand.

And until the mystery of mind is definitively solved, there's no way I'm letting Scotty beam me anywhere.

Water Cooler Question #1: Prince songs, et al.

Okay, today I shall experiment with doing a more "mainstream" type of blog--a.k.a. the quiz--and see what kind of shape it leaves my brain in.  I shall quit if I violently expel any more gray matter out of my ears than the time I accidentally glanced at something on BET.

Question:  Which song by Prince, Morris Day & the Time, Vanity 6, or any Prince-produced/"Minneapolis Sound" artist(s) is more likely to get you in the mood?  Let's see how many of you can make some reference to any Prince album that came out before "1999" or "Purple Rain" (Then again, things might get a little creepy once someone mentions "Sister" from "Dirty Mind").

How to Beg with Dignity

Leslie Esdaile Banks has recently done a blog about self-publishing over at Black Enterprise.com.  As I am also in the throes of promoting my own self-published book, I thought I'd look at each one of these steps and see how I compare to someone obviously more financially successful than I am.

I actually thought a bit this marketing even before I began writing my novel.  I didn't come up with a blasted thing as far as comprehensive strategies go, but I wonder a whole lot about how I was going to get people to buy my stuff.   My biggest problem was, and often still is, how to describe what I do to other people.  Back in the day, I'd just show somebody my work, say "check it out; see what you think" and let it go at that.  When you need a few thousand strangers to shell out good money for your stuff to make it worth your while, I'm not sure saying "Look, I don't even know what I just wrote but you should check it out anyway" is a sound marketing strategy.

All I'd really done was tell people back on my blog back on the late great MySpace that I was writing a novel and posting up chapters of the rough draft for a select few people to read and let it go at that.  This is when I learn a harsh, but valuable, lesson about putting up free reading material:  making something free to reading isn't often a guarantee that people can always afford it.  If you write lengthy material (and if any of you read my old blog, you'd know I can get serious long-winded), people may not just have the TIME.  And I've already gone on record as saying that my Latrina Emerson story is looking to be a long one.

So I haven't come up with a marketing strategy as much as adapted to the one that evolved around me.  I tried to stay in contact with people on a regular basis.  I comment on their pages whenever I can come with something remotely worthwhile to say.  I try to make my promos as interesting and frequent as possible and hope I don't annoy too many potential readers.  And I try to make sure my books are worth people's time and money.  I've also been fortunate enough to have friends help me with various aspects of getting my book in shape and getting the word out there.  I suppose that's the best I can do.

That and work on the next book.

So After a Long Time Away, I Get....

A follower?  You mean, somebody out there is actually READING these things?  Oh great, now I gotta actually write something.

"ALL THE BLOG'S A PAGE" FEATURE

Shon Bacon has kindly given me some space on her blog to talk a little about my book and good books in general.  Those who find amusement in me stumbling over my words can click on the following link.

"All the Blog's a Page" hosted by Shon Bacon (1/17/2011)