5 ms·

Ontology, not ontologies, have been tried. We have quite a good understanding that a system cannot be both sound a complete, regardless people went straight in

Ontology, not ontologies, have been tried. We have quite a good understanding that a system cannot be both sound a complete, regardless people went straight in to make a single model of the world.

Xmd5a 1y ago
Could you define sound and complete in this context ? IIRC Rust's borrow checker is sound (will not mark something dysfunctional as functional) but not complete: some programs would take too long to verify, the checker times out, and compilation fails even though the program is potentially correct.
- tossandthrow 1y ago
  The meaning of the word person is ~sound (ie. Well defined) when two lawyers speak. But when a doctor tells the lawyer that they operated a person, the lawyer can reasonably say "huh" - the concept of a person has shifted with the context.
kachnuv_ocasek 1y ago
> a system cannot be both sound a complete Huh, what do you mean by this? There are many sound and complete systems – propositional logic, first-order logic, Presburger arithmetic, the list goes on. These are the basic properties you want from a logical or typing system. (Though, of course, you may compromise if you have other priorities.)
- lemonwaterlime 1y ago
  My take is that the GP was implicitly referring to Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorems with the implication being that a system that reasons completely about all the human topics and itself is not possible. Therefore, you’d need multiple such systems (plural) working in concert.
  - eru 1y ago
    That doesn't make much sense. If you take multiple systems and make them work in concert, you just get a bigger system.
    - tossandthrow 1y ago
      Concerts - again plural. And naturally you only bring in appropriate instruments.
      - svnt 1y ago
        Turtles all the way down?
    - jijijijij 1y ago
      > If you take multiple systems and make them work in concert, you just get a bigger system. The conclusion may be wrong, but a "bigger system" can be larger than the sum of its constituents. So a system can have functions, give rise to complexity, neither of its subsystems feature. An example would be the thinking brain, which is made out of neurons/cells incapable of thought, which are made out of molecules incapable of reproduction, which are made from atoms incapable of catalyzing certain chemical reactions and so on.
      - svnt 1y ago
        This is just emergence, though? How is emergence related to completeness? This happens over and over with the relatively new popularization of a theory: the theory is proposed to be the solution to every missing thing in the same rough conceptual vector. It takes a lot more than just pointing in the general direction of complexity to propose the creation of a complete system, something which with present systems of understanding appears to be impossible.
        jijijijij 1y ago
        > How is emergence related to completeness? I didn't make that argument. I think, the original conclusion above isn't reasonable. However, "a concert" isn't "just" a bigger system either, which is my point.
- tossandthrow 1y ago
  Yep - when you use a multiplum of systems, then some systems can be regarded complete while other systems are sound. This is in contrast to just one system that attempts to be sound and complete.
- tossandthrow 1y ago
  None of these systems are both sound and complete. first-order logic is sound, but not complete (Ie. I can express a set of strings you can not recognize in first-order logic).
deleted 1y ago
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Ontology, not ontologies, have been tried. We have quite a good understanding that a system cannot be both sound a complete, regardless people went straight in to make a single model of the world.

Xmd5a 1y ago

Could you define sound and complete in this context ? IIRC Rust's borrow checker is sound (will not mark something dysfunctional as functional) but not complete: some programs would take too long to verify, the checker times out, and compilation fails even though the program is potentially correct.

tossandthrow 1y ago
The meaning of the word person is ~sound (ie. Well defined) when two lawyers speak. But when a doctor tells the lawyer that they operated a person, the lawyer can reasonably say "huh" - the concept of a person has shifted with the context.

kachnuv_ocasek 1y ago

> a system cannot be both sound a complete Huh, what do you mean by this? There are many sound and complete systems – propositional logic, first-order logic, Presburger arithmetic, the list goes on. These are the basic properties you want from a logical or typing system. (Though, of course, you may compromise if you have other priorities.)

lemonwaterlime 1y ago
My take is that the GP was implicitly referring to Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorems with the implication being that a system that reasons completely about all the human topics and itself is not possible. Therefore, you’d need multiple such systems (plural) working in concert.
- eru 1y ago
  That doesn't make much sense. If you take multiple systems and make them work in concert, you just get a bigger system.
  - tossandthrow 1y ago
    Concerts - again plural. And naturally you only bring in appropriate instruments.
    - svnt 1y ago
      Turtles all the way down?
  - jijijijij 1y ago
    > If you take multiple systems and make them work in concert, you just get a bigger system. The conclusion may be wrong, but a "bigger system" can be larger than the sum of its constituents. So a system can have functions, give rise to complexity, neither of its subsystems feature. An example would be the thinking brain, which is made out of neurons/cells incapable of thought, which are made out of molecules incapable of reproduction, which are made from atoms incapable of catalyzing certain chemical reactions and so on.
    - svnt 1y ago
      This is just emergence, though? How is emergence related to completeness? This happens over and over with the relatively new popularization of a theory: the theory is proposed to be the solution to every missing thing in the same rough conceptual vector. It takes a lot more than just pointing in the general direction of complexity to propose the creation of a complete system, something which with present systems of understanding appears to be impossible.
      - jijijijij 1y ago
        > How is emergence related to completeness? I didn't make that argument. I think, the original conclusion above isn't reasonable. However, "a concert" isn't "just" a bigger system either, which is my point.
tossandthrow 1y ago
Yep - when you use a multiplum of systems, then some systems can be regarded complete while other systems are sound. This is in contrast to just one system that attempts to be sound and complete.
tossandthrow 1y ago
None of these systems are both sound and complete. first-order logic is sound, but not complete (Ie. I can express a set of strings you can not recognize in first-order logic).

deleted 1y ago

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