[lit-ideas] Re: It is worth a theorem, which is not the p minimal adequacy, since as it is, it is inconsistent. Hence Alfred Tajtelbaum, known to the ignorant of history as "tarski" proved that there exists a hierarchy such that the minimal adequacy is satisfied. That is in the "concept of truth in L" by the way studying helps.

  • From: David Ritchie <profdritchie@xxxxxxxxx>
  • To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Mon, 11 Jun 2012 15:36:23 -0700

On Jun 11, 2012, at 1:40 PM, Robert Paul wrote:

> Adriano wrote
> 
> 
>> It is worth a theorem, which is not the p minimal adequacy, since as it
>> is, it is inconsistent. Hence Alfred Tajtelbaum, known to the ignorant
>> of history as "tarski"...
> 
> 
> 'In 1923, Alfred Teitelbaum and his brother Wacław changed their surname to 
> "Tarski", a name they invented because it sounded more Polish, was simple to 
> spell and pronounce, and seemed unused.'

Should someone, I wonder, begin a petition drive to sponsor a memorial to the 
Ignorant of History?  They too must have had virtues, grandmothers, cute 
children. In our egalitarian age we have memorials to the unknown, why not to 
the unknowing?  Perhaps that's what [insert name of country you consider most 
ignorant] is today.

I started my day in an encounter with ignorance, a you haloo from a neighbor 
who speaks to me once every three years, usually with something to say about 
himself or his property or how my garden ought to be.  This time, as I hauled 
in the newspaper and struggled to bring him, sans glasses, into some kind of 
focus, the subject was cats.  Could we possibly keep our cats indoors while his 
new lawn grows?  I firmly resisted the impulse to ask whether he was in his 
right mind.  Instead, I did my best to help him explore the options.  What, 
first of all, was the exact nature of the problem?  He had seen a cat, possibly 
one of ours, scratching once in the sand that he's had expensive gardeners lay 
down, prior to re-seeding his grassage (my term for grassy acreage).  If a cat 
were to scratch again, he worried, he'd have to repair that particular seeded 
bit of inchage.  So the plain obvious solution would be for us to keep our cats 
indoors for a week or three.  

I asked him if he knew anything about how cats divide territory or why they 
might be scratching.  When he acknowledged ignorance, I explained that cats 
divide space temporally and that if any cat relinquishes his or her claim, 
another will move into that time slot.  Thus keeping two cats indoors will only 
result in a transfer of cattage domain.  And scratching is usually a sign of 
doing business, acts that he can interrupt or deter. He clearly wasn't sure he 
liked the way the conversation was tending.  I think he must have been an only 
child.

Thanks, in passing, to Adriano and Robert for causing me to look into Tarski's 
history.  I knew nothing of his life; now I know something.  Thanks also to 
those who joined in yesterday's mucking about in gardens and so on.  A little 
lightness fortifies, is what I find.

David Ritchie,
Portland, Oregon    
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