Philosophic Noodling (was Re: Internet Health)

[Paul Seamons]

On 10/06/2010 12:52 AM, Levi Pearson wrote:
> And whether something
> is "real" or not in some philosophical sense has almost no bearing on
> whether that thing is useful or even calculable.
>    
Well put.

While I find the discussion about what is "real" intriguing, after some 
time I finally give up and laugh and remember what little I understand 
of Godel's Incompleteness theorem, essentially that a comprehensive 
definition of a system can't be gathered while constrained to the that 
same system.  I eventually end up at your conclusion that even though I 
can't explain everything perfectly, my accepted definitions of them are 
useful and meaningful to me.  I don't know how time operates 
fundamentally, but I can measure it consistently and reliably; and it is 
useful enough to me to know that from my frame of reference time passes 
by far too quickly, and sometimes not fast enough.

And to return to a slightly more on topic and flame-able subject, 
spending too much time worrying about the reality or dimensionality of 
time is akin to using a graphics only screen saver that consumes 80% CPU 
(it is nice to look at and pass the time but wastes a lot of energy not 
getting anything done).

Paul