Monthly Archives: January 2017

Countable Infinity and Rick and Morty

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Countable InfinityWhen it comes to math, I think it is best that I assume everyone is really ignorant. So forgive me for going over some really basic ideas about infinity. But I have good reasons for doing this. Some time ago, I wrote, Infinity Is Not a Number. In it, I discuss how the great Christian apologist William Lane Craig used a total misunderstanding of infinity to “prove” that the universe is not eternal. I was pointing out that this brilliant man was ignorant of the fact that infinity is not a number.

I guess I can understand. Mathematicians use infinity (∞) along with a lot of numbers. To understand infinity as a mathematical concept, you really have to study limits. And that isn’t something students get into until college — if then. It’s really when you start to study calculus that you get into limits. And that is done for the opposite reason: to understand the infinitesimal. It’s actually the same thing, but I won’t bore you with it. You either understand what I’m talking about (It’s the reciprocal, stupid!) or you would require a good deal more exposition than I’m willing to expend.

Countable Infinity

But there are some things about infinity that are intuitive to people of this time and place. For example, if you think of the whole numbers (0, 1, 2, 3…), you know that there are an infinity of them. Regardless of what natural number you can come up with, there is always a number that is one unit larger. Let’s combine the whole numbers with all the negative whole numbers (…, -2, -1, 0, 1, 2, …) that infinity space is twice as large. But that doesn’t mean there are twice as many integers as whole numbers. Both sets contain an infinite number of elements. But they are both “countably infinite.”

So what does it mean that they are countably infinite? It means that you can pick any number in the series and count to it. Consider the whole numbers again (because it is easier). You can count from 0 to 15,000,000 or 15,000,000,000 or whatever. It will just take time. If you have an infinite amount of time, I guess you could count all the whole numbers (and, unintuitively, the integers). (Note: this is one reason immortality is so terrifying: eventually you would get to the point of counting all the whole numbers.)

Rational Numbers

Now let’s consider the rational numbers from 0 to 1. These are just the fractions. You can tell that they are countably infinite. You just start counting: 0/1, 1/1, 0/2, 1/2, 2/2, 0/3, 1/3, 2/3, 3/3, etc. It doesn’t matter that many of the numbers of duplicates. The denominators go on forever. Thus, the number series is infinite. And we know it is countable because we are counting it. In theory, we can count all of the numbers. The same is true of all the rational numbers — not just the ones between 0 and 1.

So a countable infinity of countable infinities is a countable infinity. You would think that all infinities would thus be countable. But no.

Irrational numbers are numbers that cannot be represented as a fraction of two integers. You know: numbers like π and e. The set of all these numbers does not represent a countable infinity. Indeed, the irrational numbers between any two numbers are not a countable infinity. Think about it. It’s mind blowing.

Rick and Morty

Rick and MortyI was thinking about this because I was watching an episode of Rick and Morty, “Rick Potion No 9.” In it, Rick turns his human world into Cronenberg-world. So in order to fix things, Rick goes looking for another reality, “There’s an infinite number of realities, Morty. And in a few dozen of those, I got lucky and turned everything back to normal. I just had to find one of those realities in which we also happened to both die around this time.” (Note: if there were an infinite number of realities, there would be an infinite number of realities where Rich “got luck,” but I’ll leave that as something to consider on your own time.)

The implication of this episode (and others) is that at every instant, there are an infinite number of realities, and each one creates an infinite reality at that point — and on and on and on. I’ve long thought this is what Planck time must represent: the time at which every possible quantum reality is spawned. But that doesn’t much matter. It’s just a thought. But I like Rick’s idea of an infinite universes (“realities”) constantly spawning an infinite number of universes.

Countably Infinite Universes

As outrageous as this notion is, it would still represent a countably infinite number of universes. I find that vaguely comforting. Of course, there’s all that dark matter and dark energy. Maybe that’s where the non-countably infinite universes exist. I don’t really care. I don’t like thinking about things that can’t be counted. Irrational numbers are as strong a proof of the non-existence of God that I can think of.

But let me leave you with a practical thought. As many of you know, I think memorizing multiplication tables is a waste of time. I think children would be better served watching Rick and Morty. They’d have a chance of thinking about math. And it wouldn’t make them hate math. Finally, it might get them to watch Existenz.

Rick and Morty image cropped from one at Wired. Licensed under Fair Use. Because of course everything has to be copyrighted forever. How else would we have the idyllic world we now live in? Infinity image is in the public domain.

The Iraq War Was a Major Success — For Some

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Cenk UygurHere’s the thing we always misunderstand: we always think that the Iraq War was a disaster — it was a failure.

No it wasn’t. It was declared by (in essence) Dick Cheney, who was, by all accounts, running the country from 2001 to 2006. And Bush, for better or for worse, took charge in the last two years. And believe it or not, it was slightly better than the Cheney years.

Now Cheney, who used to work for Halliburton and got a $34 million exit bonus from them, started a war where Halliburton’s stock price went up five fold during the war.

Mission accomplished!

–Cenk Uygur
Michael Moore Puts Obama’s Legacy In Sad, Simple Terms

Image cropped from Cenk Uygur at Streamys 2010 by Andy Sternberg. Licensed under CC BY 2.0.

Keith Ellison and the Difficult Path Forward

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Keith EllisonWe are less than two months away from the election for the DNC chairmanship. This year, it has taken on an over-sized importance among American liberals. The front-runner is Minnesota Representative Keith Ellison. And you would think his election would be a sure thing. He’s been endorsed by Elizabeth Warren on the economic left and Chuck Schumer on the economic right. But the whole thing has unfortunately turned into a proxy war between Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton — as if we need to run the presidential primary all over again.

Jeff Stein wrote a very good overview of what’s going on, The DNC Race Has Become Another Fight Over Bernie Sanders When Dems Need It Least. As he indicates, the push to get Thomas Perez in the position shows how stupid this all is. The two men are pretty much identical ideologically. I certainly admire them both. But why is it that Ellison is not acceptable? The best example of this was how Ellison was unacceptable because the job should be full-time. But as soon as Keith Ellison said he would step down as Representative if elected, new reasons to be against him popped up. There’s clearly a more fundamental reason that Ellison is unacceptable — just not one that Democratic Party elites want to talk about openly.

Elites Don’t Like Keith Ellison

The truth is that political parties are the way that their elites want them to be. And those elites don’t want things to change. And this was always my biggest concern about Bernie Sanders winning the Democratic primary. I voted for him, of course. But I saw the complaints that Sanders supporters wouldn’t support Clinton as being more projection than anything else. That is to say: there were far more Clinton supporters who would never have voted for Sanders than their were Sanders voters who didn’t vote for Clinton.

We’ve seen this same kind of thing in the UK Labour Party. Jeremy Corbyn’s election as leader of the party has been met with extreme hostility. There is a huge part of the Labour Party elite that would rather see the Tories in power than Labour in power if it were led by Corbyn. And I think we would have seen the same thing with Bernie Sanders in the Democratic Party if he had won the primary.

Trump and the Republicans Are Different

And note: this is not equivalent to Donald Trump and the Republican Party. In as much as the Republican elite was ever really against Trump, it was because he was seen as (1) personally offensive and (2) unelectable. The issue was never ideological. Yes, there was a little ideological heterodoxy at first. But as soon as Trump came out with his tax plan that was a huge giveaway to the rich, the Republicans knew they had nothing to fear from Trump. The issue with Corbyn and Sanders (And Keith Ellison!) is different. In each of these cases, the liberal party is afraid that it will have leaders that are ideologically in sync with their voters. That is to say: they are afraid that the liberal party will be run by actual liberals.

The Democratic Party Is Moving Forward — Regardless

It doesn’t matter to me if Ellison or Perez become DNC chair. Actually, I’d kind of like to see Perez in the position because I want them both fighting for us in high profile positions. But it’s clear that the push for Perez is not about that. The push for him is about telling the base of the party that it isn’t in charge. Yes, Perez is as liberal as Ellison, but the more conservative elites can ignore that. Allowing Keith Ellison to become chair would be an unmistakable indication that the Democratic Party has changed and that the New Democrats are dead, after doing so much damage to the nation and the party.

But like most fearful efforts to hang onto what little power you have, the anti-Ellison campaign will likely fail. I find it annoying that we are even having this fight. Part of being a liberal is believing in democracy. So there really shouldn’t be a big effort to stop the Democratic party from representing the base. But it’s okay. I think the Democratic Party will get to where it needs to go. Eventually. Despite the wishes of too many in the party elite who represent the past and not the present (much less the future).

Image of Keith Ellison is in the public domain.

Teaching Don Octavio How to See Reality

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Don Juan DeMarco and Don OctavioI haven’t seen a deed, but I assume this villa is yours… [Someone who says otherwise] has a rather limited and uncreative way of looking at the situation.

Look, you want to know if I understand that this is a mental hospital? Yes, I understand that. But then how can I say that you are Don Octavio, and I am a guest at your villa, correct? By seeing beyond what is visible to the eye.

Now, there are those, of course, who do not share my perceptions, it’s true. When I say all my women are dazzling beauties, they object. The nose of this one is too large. The hips of another, they are too wide, perhaps. The breasts of a third, they are too small. But I see these women for how they truly are: glorious, radiant, spectacular, and perfect — because I am not limited by my eyesight.

Women react to me the way that they do, Don Octavio, because they sense that I search out the beauty that lies within them until it overwhelms everything else. And then they cannot avoid their desire to release that beauty and envelop me in it.

So to answer your question: I see as clear as day that his great edifice in which we find ourselves is your villa. It is your home. And as for you, Don Octavio del Flores, you are a great lover like myself, even though you may have lost your way… and your accent.

–Don Juan
in Don Juan DeMarco

Don Juan DeMarco image taken from Amazon. Licensed under Fair Use.

The Joke of Existence: Happy New Year!

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The Joke of Existence - The Nihilist by Paul Merwart

I generally think in terms of days. This is why I manage to make at least 365 foundational errors every year: each day I choose to continue on being conscious of the universe. But today, let’s consider this whole year that we look toward. Are we really all going to sit through the whole thing? I think it makes the question of continued survival more stark. Yes, I can make it through the next day. But the next year? Given that we know it will be much like last year, it’s hard to answer in the affirmative.

The Meaning of Life

Many people ask, “What is the meaning of life?” That’s a stupid question. Can you honestly look forward or back on your life and see any meaning in it? I don’t want to upset anyone who really hasn’t been paying attention, but life is meaningless.

For most people, I stand as an object lesson for never allowing a teenager to read Schopenhauer. So I’m on record — repeatedly — about my belief that the continuance of life — the will to live — is an irrational thing. But one needn’t be rational in all things. Indeed, I write more about the irrationality of humans than I do Schopenhauer. One of the easiest ways to annoy me is to tell me that humans are rational. They aren’t — even in little ways.

It’s because of this that I have a thin reed to hang onto as I continue into the future. Perhaps you will find it helpful.

You Make the Universe Worse

I have a great love of anti-art. This is the kind of art that is created only for the process itself. So an example of anti-art might be a digital music device programmed to destroy itself before playing any of the music it was programmed to play. It is art explicitly created for no one. And I am a work of art created for no one. (When you get into ontological matters, it gets hard to distinguish between the implicit and the explicit.) I like to learn things, gain skills, create stuff — all while knowing that they are all ephemeral.

An enormous amount of the universe’s energy has been used to fight entropy and create me. And then I exist for a period of time before giving into entropy. Ultimately, I will have taken very useful energy and turned it into heat, which is a decidedly poor energy source. The universe will be more chaotic after I’ve gone than it was before I existed. So the universe has greatly harmed itself for the purpose of creating a machine that understood for a short period of time that universe was doing this.

And that is hilarious!

More Than You Think

It’s even more hilarious when you consider that the vast majority of people on earth are too caught up in their delusions of meaning to even know the joke exists — much less to get it. And that’s to say nothing of billions of years of evolution of creatures that didn’t get the joke.[1] So why not hang around for another year?

Think of yourself as conscious toxic waste. Wouldn’t you want to hang around as long as possible soiling your environment? But if you don’t like that analogy, you can feel good that most of the damage that your existence has done to the universe has already been done. Maintaining your wasteful machine is pretty cheap. And depending upon how funny you think your existence is, maybe it’s a net positive.

Existence Is a Joke

We are all a joke. If more people understood that, maybe we would live in a more just society. Because when you know that existence is a joke, you also know that it has nothing to do with justice. Your existence is a waste of elementary particles. In this next year, thousands of children will be burned alive. And a trust-fund baby will get the biggest ego stroke on the planet by being the leader of the “free” world. Try not to think of that. Focus on what a waste you are in this universe. That might get you through to next year when I promise I’ll have a whole new reason for irrationally continuing on.

[1] Or maybe all these “lesser” brains did and do get the joke. Maybe this whole self-awareness thing makes the joke harder to get. Maybe when a female mantis is biting the head of her mate, she is laughing up a storm, thinking, “Can you believe this?!” The male might be thinking the same thing in its final milliseconds of consciousness. For the record, I suspect that no mantis, dog, or cat actually gets the joke. But they do have us beat in not thinking themselves rational. Biting the heads off your mate is just what you do.