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one of the things that I find fascinating about language is the way it can become twisted with self reference and paradox. Douglas Hofstadter dwells on this extensively in his writing. Here are some of his examples (which remind me in a twisted way of some of our ongoing discussions):
- This line from Shakespeare has delusions of grandeur.
- If writers were bakers, this sentence would be exactly a dozen words long.
- I don't care who wrote this sentence -- whoever he is he's a damn sexist!
-What would life be, without me?
here are some that involve translation issues:
-Would not be anomalous if were in Italian.
-When one this sentence into the German to translate wanted, would one the fact exploit, that the word order and the punctuation already with the German conventions agree.
and finally, "Hofstadter's Law" states: "It always takes longer than you think it will take, even if you take into account Hofstadter's Law."
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Depressing this sentence's subject, plunged her into a fugue.
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"Front to back", Crab said canonically!
To take it even further:
Canon said crabbily "front to back"; Crab said canonically "back to front".
(so sorry, I just can't help myself)
This post obversely needs help.
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By describing the massive man, she increased the sentence's subject.
By saying nothing she decreased the subject's sentence.
These are so many different variations of different kinds of self-references, aren't there?
I really should be studying. I have an exam Tuesday, and the temptation to play with words far exceeds the temptation to to study. hmmmmmmmm.
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#4683
04/10/2002 10:49 AM
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You can tell DH is a fan of lisp.
Did you notice the self-reference in the bibliography of GEB? I didn't notice until an acquaintance pointed it out to me.
(I recently read Neal Stephenson's Cryptonomicon. He has a phoney character in there with the initials GEB, which I assume is a barb at DH.)
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Wow, very appropriate, FF! I wasn't at all sure I could see these hidden pictures on my monitor--it is very difficult for me even when they're on paper; I can't even always see them. These things are just magical, to me--there's nothing there--but there IS!
For those who don't know, the trick to seeing these is to let your eyes unfocus a little, and keep them from re-focusing normally. I can get them unfocused by leaning forward till the surface picture blurs--my problem comes in preventing them from refocusing as I slowly lean back. And even when I can, it takes some time for me to be able to see the hidden shapes, but when I do...WOW!
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Re:They're stereograms.
Okay, back to words-- i have heard them called
RAS-- Random dot Astiogram S, pronounced, RAZZ(as in razz a ma tazz) -- why astiogram's? i dunno. don't remember all the detail of them either.
Steve Pinker has an nice explaination of how and why they work in How the Mind Words, someplace about page 340, (give or take 20 pages or so)if you want some details, thats one place to look.--opps, i slipped there-- but it was an interesting, and challenging concept to understand, and i reread it several times, and still only have a vague understanding.
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That's one of my favorite books.
It's got one of my all time funniest sorta-stories innit. It's the "meat can think?" bit he claimed to have gotten off the Internet. Funny, funny story.
There are some math and programming sites on the web that go into some detail on the stereograms. There's also some free software you can download to make them - which I plan to try some day.
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here is the one and only google hit on "meat can think", is it this to which Pinker referred? http://pages.infinit.net/philoex/dennett.html()
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Nope, although this reference might have its origin in the same story.
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I'll look for it, its a short Sci Fi story, now in the archive of a BB of a .alt newsgroup.. if you want to use google, do an advanced search and look for newsgroups. i stumpled across it years ago. (at least 4!) so its old!
i am sure my son knows exactly where its is.. but will he tell me in a timely manner?
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I've looked there (several times) and wasn't able to find it.
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#4692
04/10/2002 11:26 PM
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self-reference in the bibliography of GEB
That would be "Copper, Silver, Gold: an Indescribable Metal Alloy, by Egbert B Gebstadter..."?
GEB is Godel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid, by Douglas R Hofstadter, originally published by Basic Books in 1979 and still in print in paperback. It's a sweeping tour-de-force, about self-reference in art, music, mathematics, biology, DNA, the mind, artificial intelligence, and many other things [highly oversimplified]. For those who haven't read it there is a highly laudatory review in Scientific American, July 1979, in Martin Gardiner's "Mathematical Games" column.
GEB won the ALPA award for nonfiction that year, then the Pulitzer prize, and has the dubious distinction of having been called "the most esoteric book ever to reach #1 on the New York Times Best-Seller list." It's full of puzzles, wordplay, ingenious twists. Many but not all of the posers have answers given, often hidden but detectable.
PS. The Cryptonomicon (Neal Stephenson) "GEB" character was named for three other characters - Gunther, Enoch, and Bobbie. (You may infer that both the Hofstadter and the Stephenson books are among my favorites!)
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#4693
04/11/2002 12:44 PM
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That would be "Copper, Silver, Gold: an Indescribable Metal Alloy, by Egbert B Gebstadter..."?
That would be it!
PS. The Cryptonomicon (Neal Stephenson) "GEB" character was named for three other characters - Gunther, Enoch, and Bobbie. (You may infer that both the Hofstadter and the Stephenson books are among my favorites!)
Now THAT is intruiging. Was I right that NS was tweaking someone and wrong about whom it was he was tweaking?
Cryptonomicon is my very favorite book. GEB was very enjoyable, but there were a few things I didn't understand very well.
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#4694
04/11/2002 12:52 PM
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... or about another Hofstaedter wonder: Le Ton Beau de Marot - what a delightful read about translation, artificial intelligence, love -- full of wordplay in several languages
the main text is in English, despite the title
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#4695
04/12/2002 12:39 AM
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>The Cryptonomicon "GEB" character was named for three other characters - Gunther, Enoch, and Bobbie.
> Now THAT is intruiging. Was I right that NS was tweaking someone and wrong about whom it was he was tweaking?
It's too carefully crafted to have been inadvertent, but I've never seen it addressed. Not that I've looked too hard. There are Neal Stephenson websites but I have't searched them for this.
> GEB was very enjoyable, but there were a few things I didn't understand very well.
Only a few ? Count yourself highly perceptive. I can share a few of my prouder insights if you're interested - PM probably the more appropriate forum for this. (The dialogue with Cops Silva and Gould in particular is my favorite, speaking of Indescribable Metal Alloy...)
>Cryptonomicon is my very favorite book.
High on my list too. I understand there is a whole trilogy laid out, with the second part in the works at this very moment - though I can't for the life of me figure out what he might be planning by way of follow-up.
By the way, for a prequel to Cryptonomicon, I found Enigma by Robert Harris to be a captivating introduction to the subject of cryptography, WW2 vintage.
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#4696
04/12/2002 12:36 PM
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> GEB was very enjoyable, but there were a few things I didn't understand very well.
Only a few ?
hehehe. I was understating the obvious. I doubt there were many people who weren't left scratching their heads over a great portion of that book. Although I was already writing recursive programs at the time and I *felt* comfortable with it. Of course, there's understanding and there's UNDERSTANDING. My biggest confusion was the music tie-in, maybe because I didn't already know something about it. It's been years since I read it, but the connection seemed pretty weak.
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FallibleFiend> I've looked there (several times) and wasn't able to find it.My sentiments exactly about those *&#@% stereograms.   
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ditto!
I've never had problems when they were on paper, but on the computer screen -- it just ain't happenin' for me!
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hehehe. Ya, know, the first million times or so I tried to see 'em, I couldn't either.
Then, I don't know, something magical happened right about 1,000,001.
Now I can usually see them in a few seconds.
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Never had any difficulty before (that's one of the very few benefits of the nearsigted vision of age, boronia!) but I have to agree with boronia:
I've never had problems when they were on paper, but on the computer screen -- it just ain't happenin' for me!
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I've never had problems when they were on paper, but on the computer screen -- it just ain't happenin' for me!
So print them, like I did!
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it just ain't happenin' for me!
I've rarely been able to get the image to pop out (convex), but if I just cross my eyes I can see it recede (concave). I can usually make out the image, but it looks like a cast molding of the actual image.
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