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Tom
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 11/3/2003 2:16 AM (GMT -6) |   | Well, Anita and I finally got back together again after weeks of traveling had us apart. I basically slept for two days worn out from jet-lag. Today I was feeling like myself again and said, “Hey babe, let me take you out to lunch!” Anita said, “Sure, let’s go!” Here’s part of the conversation we had over lungh at Chili’s…
Anita: So tell me hun, how’d your visit with Greg Boyd and your friends in St. Paul go?
Tom: Great! We had a couple of great discussions.
A: Like what?
T: Oh, like that might-counterfactual thing we’ve been debating for almost a year. I few things were said that really helped me get a hold of it and I posted what I think really solves the puzzle.
A: Cool. So how’d you solve it?
T (Thinking to myself, “OK, you asked for it”): I’ll show you. Oh waiter, do you have a pen I can borrow? (Waiter brings pen). Thank you. OK, over two thousand years ago Aristotle came up with this idea of a square of opposition, and it…
A: A square of what?
T: A square of opposition. It’s just a way of describing how propositions asserting different things about a particular event or claim inter-relate, like contraries and contradictions, that sort of thing. (Tom draws a square with “All grass is green” etc. on it. Anita orders her meal.)
A: OK. So what was the puzzle you had to solve?
T: It had to do with “might” and “might not” on the square and whether or not and how the square accounts for propositions expressing what is determinately or indeterminately the case.
A: Like…?
T: Like God knowing yesterday, or eternally, that “Tom will have the ice-cream brownie for desert after lunch at Chili's on Nov. 3rd, 2003.” That’s a claim about the future. Is it true? Is it false? What about “Tom MIGHT have the ice-cream brownie after today’s lunch”?
A: Well, I already know the truth value of that one.
T: You THINK you know it, but you’re not omniscient.
A: When it comes to YOU I a…
T: Do you want to know how I solved the puzzle or not?
A: OK, go ahead.
T: Well, the question is, ‘Does God ever know ‘mights’ about our future in this world as TRUE?’
A: Duh, like of course.
T: Yeah, but how do you show it logically on the square? For almost a year we’ve been toying with different approaches and finally came up with (slowly takes a sip of his strawberry margurita)…
A: With what?
T: With a triangle. (Tom then goes into a 30 minute gut-wrenching schpeel about the triangle, counterfactuals, Alan’s three metaphysical states of affairs, quantifiable and non-quantifiable propositions, etc.).
A: Wow, hun. That’s sounds interesting. So are you right? I mean, did Doc or Alan or anybody else (implying that my theory needed their confirmation, which of course is correct!) agree with you?
T: Not yet. I just posted a bunch of stuff. We’ll see.
(pause in the conversation)
T: Hunny, I just wanna apologize for obsessing with the counterfactual stuff the past few months. I just enjoyed it so much and got so much energy from it.
A: Yeah.
T: I was kinda out of balance for a while.
A: Yeah. And what about now? Is “Tom is balanced” a true or false proposition?
T: Well, I think it’s true. But only God knows for sure.
A: God and one other person know the truth value of THAT proposition.
T: Yeah right. And who else would know infallibly whether I’m truly balanced or not?
A: Me.
T: Eh, waiter! Check please!
A: Don't you wanna have desert too?
T: Yeah. Eh, almost forgot. Eh, I'll have the ice-cream brownie and a cappachino.
A: Told ya.
End of discussion | | Back to Top | | |
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Starkman
Registered Member
Date Joined Oct 2001
Total Posts : 1747
| Posted 11/3/2003 3:46 AM (GMT -6) | | Well, I could have told you it would happen that way, Tom. You just didn't ask me!!
sTARKMAN ... I HATE THAT DARNED CAPS KEY!
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