Glad that I am uneducated.....
I will confess that I am proud of my little quiz, I think it is bit clever.
Then yesterday I was told that my answer was wrong because,
"XXX: it would have made sense if deep blue was self build but it is run and designed by human hands
me: ???
XXX: krishna taking on t gods was not guided by gods".
Setting aside the question whether free will exists and what are the philosophical implications of absence of free will, here is the thing, analogies are pretty elastic but there is something called overstretching your case, when it simply snaps.
So since the theme was about creation overcoming creator, free will is as relevant to the fact that Deep blue is made of VLIC and King was made of protein.
Here is the moral of the story,
Majority of people treat education same way as a monkey treats a hammer.
Let this be known Gaurav's law on education.
8 comments:
Analogies can definitely make a lot of sense and they can definitely also be overstretched - here it is not clear who is doing the overstretching. XXX accuses you of overstretching the analogy because there are no exact parallels, while you think he/she is overstretching your analogy because there need't be any parallels. I tend to go with you on this one because it was a bloody quiz question - if it's not oblique, it's not fun. A similar analogy presented as an argument in a discussion would make little sense, however. Most stretched analogies that break down on closer inspection are classic examples of soundbytes posing as arguments- we think/say something because it sounds good or clever to us, but we clearly haven't thought it through. ;) (Entropy? Really? I mean I know you weren't serious, but still.)
As for free will, I think the entire debate about it is inconsequential to our socio-politico-economic strutures. Apart from the fact that all that Libet has proved is that even some medium term decisions are taken by most people before the conscious voluntary part of the brain comes into action (and not that there exists no free will conclusively, as the one and only Jagadguru believes so fervently), this deterministic line of thought makes no diference to our reactions. Will we stop punishing rapists if one day it is conclusively proven that they have some kind of a 'rape gene' and do not take the decision to rape very consciously? We base our laws, policies etc based on the human actions that we observe, not on the deeper basis of these actions (except in those cases where the deeper basis implies that the person doesn't even have cognition of his/her actions). This extra layer in between makes the deterministic/free will debate rather academic, quite irrelevant to our social setups. Even if Ayn Rand was wrong, it doesn't imply that capitalism does not have a bais in human nature, etc.
Ritwik,
I would put it differently, One takes license when one is speculating on philosophy or science or more generally about any something which is not well understood, more so if it is about the ultimate imponderable, "destiny of human kind". More than being a quiz it was a speculation on our future, viz. Will hunaity be replaced by someone else ? so I should be allowed some leeway when I compare with some story of mine with mythical refrences.But then I am a big fan of Asimov.
About free will, I dont know much about it. In this case my reason and my intuition go in opposite direction. If I come to some answer then may be I will post about it.
Lastly why exactly is analogy with entropy so funny ?
1. Agree
2. Even I'm sketchy about the details of the debate. Jagadguru can atleast take credit for arousing my interest in it.
3. I have a strong conviction that all the literal, technical implications of a tecnical phrase/term/concept need to be considered, understood and mastered before one extends it into a philosophical/social analogy. I did not think the entropy analogy was funny, I found it quite senseless. Let me explain.
Entropy, physical or philosophical, is universal. This much was implicit in the analogy as well. Hence, when it is mentioned as the cause for India's decay (you did not explicitly compare us with anyone except for our forefathers, but it is clear that the west has somehow avoided such a fate - their past may not have been glorious but they are not similarly declining either), one is forced to ask - what is so special about entropy with reference to India?
Secondly, if indeed it is human life and civilization itself that increases entropy (philosphical, again) and causes decay, then ALL civilizations, by definition, were at their prime at the very begining. The people who created the Vedas were superior to us, the people who did not create the Vedas but preceded them, were also superior to the Veda-creators. Is this what you wanted to imply? I guess not, but your analogy did precisely that.
The rise and decay of human civilization is cyclical(if such a thing even happens, but we will assume that it does). Not everything that is cyclical is reversible. An implication that the inevitable destruction and 'loss of entropy' that will come about due to decay will somehow be 'better' (it is implied that this wil be beter, as it is implied that today's state of more entropy is worse than the Vedic stage of comparatively less entropy) glosses over the fact that though civilization may be decimated, universe is not in the same state, and entropy is not realy 'less' - the very process of rise and fall has altered the universe irreversibly. This is why I brought in the need to understand the physics of entropy before conjecturing on the philosophy of it.
To summarise,
human cibi
1) You ascribe the value judgement of 'bad' to entropy - I disagree, but I can let this pass.
2) You move fluidly to and from India to human civilization in your analogy - this negates the very purpose of the analogy.
3) You fail to take into account the difference between cyclicity and reversibility.
Basically, I felt that the entropy analogy was more or less a soundbyte, rather than a well thougt out analogy which could actually help cognition. Don't even get me started on Shadows's responses.
Anyhow, have an assignment to submit tomorrow and this discussion can go on forever - will be back later.
Gaurav,
You are wasting your time. Ritwik Priya has lot of time on his hands.. (Its the Nilu effect, he has been screwed by Nilu so often on themaanga)
An off hand comment and analogy with entropy has got him in knots.. and he is typing in pages of comments. It is an art to convey a message in the smallest number of words possible, and it doesnt come easily.
Ritwik, tu sahi hai, bas ab band kar..
Theek hai bhai, entropy ka equation galat likha meine.. Usko pakad kar baat kee khal noch lee tune, but you lost track of the actual topic on hand.
Anyway, I dont think many people remember the equation 10 years after their 12th standard. And particularly, when their job has nothing to do with entropy.
Get a life, dude.. have a cigar and a peg of whisky..
Shadows,
Relax :) it is just simple conversation, no flame shlame.
Besides no one flames on this blog except me and, well me :P
Shadows,
Get IQ pills. I hope that was succint enough for you.
Gaurav,
Sorry. No more, I promise.
Gaurav,
Some people have lot of time on their hands, they need to be told every little thing. A comment less than three pages will not suffice.
Examples are RitwikPriya here, and some Palahalli on Sandeepweb.
For the first time, I give credit to Dilip Dsouza. Atleast the guy does not write long boring posts and comments.. :-)
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