Hegel and unsolveability (was Re: Exorcist)

Lisa & Ian Murray seamus at accessone.com
Fri Sep 22 08:12:16 PDT 2000


On Fri, 22 Sep 2000 kenneth.mackendrick at utoronto.ca wrote:

>

> On Fri, 22 Sep 2000 10:04:40 +0200 (SAST) Peter van Heusden

<pvh at egenetics.com>

> wrote:

> [description of the halting problem snipped]

> >

> > Now, a computer can't solve this problem. My question is, can anyone?

>

> ? If I'm not mistaken, Hegel's distinction between bad and true

infinity

> 'solves' (hahhahahhha) this problem. A bad infinity is where

one finite H is

> defined through not being something else (H halting other programs -

> determinate negation). The true infinity is when it returns to

itself (H fed to

> itself) - it forms an impossible circle and the 'vanishing

mediator' of H is

> the 'remainder' - which, of course, is nothing (Hegel's pure

being)... the

> essence of H is its own self-relating negativity... quality, quantity,

> quantum...

Yeah, but we're all pretty much agreed that Hegel was talking bollocks

here, right?

Anyway, I'm no authority on Hegel, but it seems to me that this 'solution'

requires a constant state of not examining itself. Which doesn't get you

much further than a state of paranoid indecision.

Peter

=========

Hegel, like Marx, would have loved LISP and a good dose of iterative set theory if they were around [anyone know if M knew of Cantor's work?]. H.'s "bad infinity" looks like a crude attempt to get recursiveness from Aristotelian approaches to bivalence.

Ian



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