Date: Sun, 01 Sep 2002 10:37:31 -0700 From: Terry Lambert <tlambert2@mindspring.com> To: Dave Hayes <dave@jetcafe.org> Cc: "Neal E. Westfall" <nwestfal@directvinternet.com>, chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Why did evolution fail? Message-ID: <3D72505B.FF2B5345@mindspring.com> References: <200209011631.g81GV5143577@hokkshideh2.jetcafe.org>
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Dave Hayes wrote: > Terry Lambert <tlambert2@mindspring.com> writes: > > Dave Hayes wrote: > >> I claim you should not worry about what others do, your focus should= > >> be on what YOU do, and that will maximize gain for you and (somewhat= ) > >> society. You appear to claim that we have to focus on what OTHERS do= > >> and controlling them achieves more gain for you and society. > > > > How can individuals cooperate to achieve common goals, if everyone > > acts as you would have them act? By what system? > = > Eh? Why does this position imply that individuals cannot cooperate? > How can individuals cooperate at all if they do not focus on what they > do as a first priority? It doesn't imply they can't, it implies they won't. Chaos, cheating and cooperation: potential solutions to the Prisoner's Dilemma Bj=F6rn Brembs http://www.brembs.net/ipd/ Also (a bit lighter in the loafers, for people not into formal games calculus): http://www.Princeton.EDU/~mdaniels/PD/PD.html You have to take "OTHERS" into account; it's not about "controlling them", it's about communication. If you take the tack that you are "out for yourself", then you lose. Understanding the Prisoner's Dilemma, you are half way to understanding why Objectivisn is not a long term success strategy, and why you should license your code under a BSD license, rather than the GPL. 8-). > > Then allow me to operate on the principle of successive > > approximation, > = > Measuring the greatest good is not done using any continuous > increasing space of quantative measure. It's not even mathematical. You mean "I don't know the math which would enable me to model that correctly". 8-). That doesn't mean that the math does not exist (it does). > You just can't "measure" or "know" this or usefully map it to any > remotely rational or linear process. Approximations, in fact, may do > more harm than good. Dr. Jay Phippen predicted, *from theory*, the energy bounds for the W particle (among other things), very early on -- as part of his PhD work at Utah State University. I have the very good fortune to have been permitted by him to later work on the code, converting it to "C", and making it run on other than Cray computers, in the 1980's and continuing on until the early 1990's, as I was pursuing degrees in theoretical physics, applied mathematics, and computer science. This code used an approximation method called a "Monte Carlo Algorithm" to simulate pair production events, as a result of N-P and N-N collisions; the physics, in this case, was to use theory to discard "illegal" pairs, and then sort the remaining particles into buckets whose size was no smaller than the error bounding. Definition (NIST : http://www.nist.gov/dads/HTML/monteCarlo.html ) Monte Carlo Algorithim - A randomized algorithm that may produce incorrect results, but with bounded error probability. = Respectfully: a tool may only do "more harm than good" if it is used by someone who does not know how to use it correctly. > > and, when or if you come up with a better yardstick, I can siwthc to > > using it instead. > = > It's not -my- responsibility to do -your- duty. ;) How did it become my *duty*? Are you implying a belief in the Social Contract? 8-). > >> It wasn't intended to succeed or fail, actually. It was intended to > >> demonstrate. What I failed to realize was that, for a demonstration = to > >> be effective, it must fall on fertile eyes and ears. > > > > In order for a system top operate indefinitely, it must achieve > > homeostasis. > = > IYHO. ;) Definitionally. -- Terry To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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