kairosfocus

Here, a video series explores Godel’s incompleteness results: The core point is that Hilbert’s scheme collapsed, nicely summarised. The Godel incompleteness results and the Turing machine halting challenge made Mathematics irreducibly complex. So, Mathematics, too, is a venture of knowledge as warranted, credibly true (so reliable) belief, which must be open to correction. An exercise of rational, responsible faith, not utter certainty on the whole, once a sufficiently complex system is on the table. (Yes, first duties of reason obtain . . . here, there be dragons that love chick peas [Cicero . . .].) The defeasible [= defeat-able] framework for understanding knowledge extends to Mathematics. A fortiori to Computer Science and Physics, then onward across the spectrum of disciplines Read More ›

It’s time to start delivering on a promise to address “warrant, knowledge, logic and first duties of reason as a cluster,” even at risk of being thought pedantic. Our civilisation is going through a crisis of confidence, down to the roots. If it is to be restored, that is where we have to start, and in the face of rampant hyperskepticism, relativism, subjectivism, emotivism, outright nihilism and irrationality, we need to have confidence regarding knowledge. Doing my penance, I suppose: these are key issues and so here I stand, in good conscience, I can do no other, God help me. For a start, from the days of Plato, knowledge has classically been defined as “justified, true belief.” However, in 1963, Read More ›

Here: We need to think again about where we are going. END

Newton. The latest year zero reset target, as Telegraph reports: Sir Isaac Newton has been labelled as a potential beneficiary of “colonial-era activity” in draft plans to “decolonise” the engineering curriculum at Sheffield University. Students learning about the mathematician and scientist’s three laws of motion, the core of modern physics, could see changes in their teaching to explain the “global origins and historical context” of his theories, documents suggest. The plans form part of the engineering faculty’s efforts to “challenge long-standing conscious and unconscious biases” among students to tackle “Eurocentric” and “white saviour” approaches to science and maths, and promote “inclusive design”. When objectivity, core physical science and core Math are demonised through implicit, euphemistic tagging as racist, it is Read More ›

In discussing worldviews, I added an update on how they are formed and relate to plausibility structures, influencing how we decide and act individually and as community in ways that can be at least framed if not outright predicted. As such, I think this is worth headlining separately: ++++++++++ An illustration on factors and influences in worldview formation: Here, we can observe how our perceptions stimulate our thinking, which is also influenced by available knowledge, opinions and views including on key themes tied to core ideas on the world and oneself in it. As we work through our interior lives, we have perceptions, expectations, emotions, focus of attention, reasoning/logic, valuing informed by sense of duty/morals, solution strategies for challenges, discernment, Read More ›

Barna has issued new survey results that paint a stunning picture of the bellwether United States, as an utterly confused, conflicted nation, with 88 percent defaulting to incongruous worldview components, with the single largest bloc being 39% inclined to “Moralistic Therapeutic Deism.” Of course, actual full adherence is at the 1% level. Biblical theism comes first on full adherence, at 6% but that is itself a radical shift of worldviews, probably reflecting the impact of generations of cultural elites hostile to the Gospel and Gospel ethics (most often articulated in terms of its being anti-Science, outdated and intellectually indefensible . . . the standard media and “education” narratives). Such elites have long since sought to overthrow the influence of the Read More ›

We live in a civilisation haunted by doubt and by hyperskepticism. One, where skepticism is deemed a virtue, inviting hyper forms in as champions of intellect. The result has gradually led to selective hyperskepticism that often uncritically takes the word of champions or publicists for Big-S Science, while doubting well founded but unfashionable analyses or even self-evident truths. H’mm, just in case someone is unclear about or doubts that Self-Evident Truths exist, here is one . . . with an extra one for good measure: (Of course, I also have argued that there are self-evident truths regarding duty; particularly, inescapable first duties of reason that actually govern responsible reason, argument and discussion, starting with duties to truth, right reason, warrant Read More ›

In discussing implication logic and first duties, Wikipedia on ID came up yet again. The lead’s manifest failure to be responsibly objective, descending into slander from the outset, speaks volumes: Intelligent design (ID) is a pseudoscientific argument for the existence of God, presented by its proponents as “an evidence-based scientific theory about life’s origins”.[1][2][3][4][5] Proponents claim that “certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection.”[6] ID is a form of creationism that lacks empirical support and offers no testable or tenable hypotheses, and is therefore not science.[7][8][9] The leading proponents of ID are associated with the Discovery Institute, a Christian, politically conservative think tank Read More ›

In recent months we have had several forum threads, which naturally tend to throw up onward topics worth headlining. Here, I will headline some observations on implication logic in deductive and in inductive reasoning. However, first, the core of the logic of implication. Algebraically, p => q is analysed as ~[p AND ~q]. Interpreted, for whatever reason, p being so is sufficient for q to also be so. This compound proposition does NOT assert that p, only that p is sufficient for q. Similarly, q is NECESSARY for p, i.e. if q can be false and p true, q is not implied by p. As a bare structure, this is termed material implication, fleshing out the why of the implication Read More ›

Daily Mail reports on a class assignment for seven year olds that happened to be set for the daughter of a Mathematics Lecturer at Oxford. Maths lecturer is left baffled by his seven-year-old daughter’s geometry homework and turns to Twitter for help – so can YOU work out if it’s true or false? Dr Kit Yates shares his seven-year-old daughter’s maths homework to Twitter The question asked students whether a semi-circle had ‘two right angles’ or not The maths lecturer, from Oxford, admitted that he was stumped by the problem  People were left baffled by the question and came up with conflicting answers  By Kate Dennett For Mailonline Published: 17:40 GMT, 25 February 2021 | Updated: 17:40 GMT, 25 February Read More ›

Laws of Nature are a key part of the foundation of modern science. This reflects not only natural, law-like regularities such as the Law of Gravitation that promotes the Earth to the heavens (from being the sump of the cosmos) but also the perspective of many founders that they were thinking God’s creative, ordering providential and world-sustaining thoughts after him. The focal topic asks us whether our civil law is effectively an accident of power balances, or else, could it be accountable to a built in law that pivots on first duties coeval with our humanity. The issue becomes pivotal, once we ponder the premise that the typical, “natural” tendency of government is to open or veiled lawless oligarchy: So, Read More ›

We are clearly in an age of reversion to oligarchic domination and lockout of dissent, so the issue is that of formation of a counter-culture, starting with the life of the mind. H’mm, as a preliminary, let us look briefly at a refresher on a more useful ideological/political spectrum than the usual LEFT/RIGHT (which has no coherent definition of centre and right, where also Nazism/Fascism is actually of the left . . . contrary to popular notions): This is necessary because, regrettably, power dominates over essentially anything, especially in a time of deep polarisation. We can map that through the seven mountains/pillars of influence model: This naturally points to the cliff metaphor and warning: Let me add, that with our Read More ›

As the Election progresses into its third month, this week we expect a runoff election in Georgia State and the Congress is to sit to resolve the Electoral College result on the 6th. We continue to track from here and here. As developments unfold we will add further updates. END U/D1, Jan 6: Photograph demonstrating even more brazen scrutineer frustration in GA than at Nov 3+, 2020: I note, extra, by way of the earlier capture from the surveillance video on the night of 3/4 November: U/D2, Jan 7: Tucker Carlson’s warning on where undermining election integrity leads: U/D4, a reminder on McFaul Colour-Culture revolution and the SOCOM insurgency escalator: . . . also, on 4th gen war: I add, Read More ›

Guttmacher: Unintended pregnancy and abortion are experiences shared by people around the world. These reproductive health outcomes occur irrespective of country income level, region or the legal status of abortion. Roughly 121 million unintended pregnancies occurred each year between 2015 and 2019.* Of these unintended pregnancies, 61% ended in abortion. This translates to 73 million abortions per year. Worldometer has flopped over to 2021. A captured image gives abortion numbers per WHO for 2020: The 30 million spread simply tells us that these statistics are problematic. However the message — an ugly one — is clear. END

Yes, Marxist ideology pivots on the idea of mounting crises of Capitalism opening the door to socialist transformation. (Where, yes, pandemics obviously count as do incidents of police brutality or anything else that can be used to hang the failure of Capitalism and/or Christendom crisis template on.) Back in the ’30’s, Stalin thought THE Crisis had arrived, but Kondratiev — his star economist — instead produced an honest analysis that discovered generation-length long-wave cycles; oops. Stalin had him shot. Kondratiev, of course, was right. Yes, he produced a breakthrough analysis and paid for being right with his life, at the hands of the notorious Marxist Dictator, Stalin. Simplifying: The typical 8 – 11 year business cycle we worry about is Read More ›