Another Note Regarding Content

I've realized I still want to keep this blog alive, or at least in a feeble state of existence that approximates life. Unfortunately, for whatever reason, I don't have the interest or motivation to write out posts with the thought and research I'd originally planned. In fact, at this time (judging from my last post), I can't even assemble together posts that reach a definitive point backed by argument, or that are structured in a coherent manner.

But hey, then, why not just go with that? Basically, I am now relaxing the standards for my posts (wait, what? I had standards before?). Until further notice, Doubt Rests shall be a repository for half-formed thoughts, quotes, or whatever vaguely interesting factoids I come across. Don't expect explanation or justification for everything I write (although if you ask nicely I might elaborate), and certainly don't expect fully developed ideas. The contents will likely be of a more personal nature than previously. All will be fragmentary, but fragments put forth in the hope that failed attempts to progress are better than none at all.

And maybe someone, somewhere, some time might find a fragment here which fits well into his/her own thoughts.

Mrrem

Yeah, so this blog is suffering from a definite lack of attention.

I don't have any particularly meaningful, worked-out content to post now, so I'll just mention some of the things I've been thinking about lately.

I recently started learning about Alonzo Church's lambda calculus (via Penrose's The Emperor's New Mind), and I'm very impressed. It's so cool that logicians were able to construct systems like this (and like Turing's work) before the advent of computers – indeed, these logical systems led directly to and facilitated the advent of computers. They start from such simplicity, but possess incredible power.

The lambda calculus reminds me of the programming language LISP (unsurprisingly, of course, since LISP was based on this very calculus), and reading about it makes me want to get back into programming again. I dabbled with Haskell a bit at the start of this summer, and I found it oddly fascinating. There is something quite elegant about these functional* languages that more practical languages (C/C++, Python, Perl) don't quite capture.

* Apparently only certain variants of LISP (like Scheme) are fully functional, but anyway.


Still, it is difficult for me to remain interested in these things for their own sake. I think I would need some kind of projects to work toward if I were to take up programming again seriously. Ah, motivation, that state which so often eludes me...

There are so many things I would love to learn, but somehow actually sitting down and doing the work required bores me terribly. Sometimes it doesn't; sometimes I go through brief periods where I feel a great deal of enthusiasm toward some subject (say, Wittgenstein's Tractatus, or some aspect of symbolic logic), but then I end up dropping it again, feeling utterly bored with it for months.

I would like to have a very extensive knowledge of mathematics, physics, philosophy, logic, computer science, linguistics, music, and (select aspects of) history. It would be swell to know Greek, Latin, German, and French. It is so difficult to care about, though; sometimes my mind just seems to shut off, and whatever I'm currently trying to study becomes excruciatingly dull; suddenly I can't remember why I wanted to learn about it in the first place. I value knowledge generally, but to actually feel something for it, to care – somehow that is different from merely saying "I value it"?

Lack of Content

Well, as was probably inevitable, I seem to have run out of steam with this blog. That tends to happen. I guess I just haven't been quite as enthused about writing out my own thoughts on various issues, or something. This blog should probably be considered "dying."

It's not as though I really blog about anything that's genuinely philosophical, in the academic sense. I seem to excel at pseudo-philosophy more than anything else. Mreh. Writing papers for class is quite a drudgery too. For whatever reason, genuine philosophical issues seem to have soured for me.

I can't seem to make myself care about what various commentators think Kant really meant in the Transcendental Dialectic, or how his principles can be applied to field X for fascinating result Y. Do I care about the Ship of Theseus, the nature of time, or the fundamental nature of the reality? Not really, no. Not at the moment. If ever, to some degree.

What am I interested in?

I'm interested in how we as a species apply logic to the world. I'm interested in whether there's something wrong with how we conceptualize the world, generally. Could it be possible that our fundamental assumptions and frameworks are holding us back? What if there's a better way?

And yet, I don't want to do any studying that would aid me to find that out.

=/

Spiffy LaTeX script for Blogger!

I love the internet these days! A quick Google search can provide you with all sorts of nifty (although probably in the long run not so useful) information and tools. In this particular case (that inspired this blog post), I suddenly developed a hankering for the ability to use LaTeX notation for mathematical and logical notation on Blogger--not that I'll probably ever use it, mind you, and not that I'm even that familiar with LaTeX--but I digress. Blogger doesn't support LaTeX natively, but one swift search later and I'd discovered this Greasemonkey script which, after a very painless installation, sticks a nice friendly button on to the Blogger post editor. This button converts LaTeX notation into images and automatically uploads them into your post for manipulation. (This is all providing that you use Firefox. But of course you use FireFox! Just like any other self-respecting net citizen these days.)

Multipurpose example (to prove that it's working; to see how it looks with my blog colors; to increase my familiarity with LaTeX... or should I say, ):

Or something. Loosely a formulation of Leibniz' Indiscernibility of Identicals. This isn't an ideal solution to notational problems (for example, if you want to make a change in a really lengthy expression, you'd better have copied the text version somewhere because it doesn't convert from images back to text. Also, perhaps not so useful when writing away from my home computer, at least not if I want to see how the results turn out). But man, it's still pretty awesome to have something this convenient. Trés cool!

As a thanks to the author, here's a link to his/her blog (linking there is what he/she recommends by way of thanks): http://servalx02.blogspot.com/

Another note about content

Even my more in-depth posts do not spend a lot of time directly addressing specific scientific or philosophical issues. General trends are great fun to write about, but I would like to write at least a few essays that focus on some particular problem, or that respond directly to some contemporary writer. Also, my posts still wander all over the place--this is good in that I see connections between disparate subjects, but it must be frustrating for the reader to follow.

I find it vastly amusing that I am currently thoroughly uninterested and unmotivated in my classes, yet I have such an interest in writing my own academic-quality work. Or something.

I'll see what I can do.

New Site Banner

For some reason I thought it would be a grand idea to make a new banner for this blog, even though I've got all the design ability (and sensibility) of an orangutan. Or maybe less. Maybe orangutans would actually make fabulous web designers, who knows? Anyway, I'll probably keep tweaking it a bit (and the site's background colors) since they're a bit less than perfect at the moment. It looks kinda amateur right now, but at least it's more original than a default Blogger template, right?

I always marvel at this peculiarity: when I evaluate something for aesthetic cohesion, I'm quite adept at making judgments about (what are for my tastes) good or bad color choices, good or bad fonts, relative spacing, clarity, composition, etc. However, when I'm actually making a new piece of design (or visual art), I find it so difficult to get things to cohere properly. I can't quite find that right set of colors which will make everything gorgeous, I can't quite find the right shapes, etc., etc. Same problem as any artistic endeavor, I suppose--lacking the necessary experience, I'm simply bad at it until I get a chance to develop more.

Anyway, the painting on the left side is from the talented Stella Im Hultberg, used without permission... because I'm too lazy to email and ask, and I don't know that it matters that much on a blog that no one visits.

Also, about the site in general: I'm concerned at the growing number of "frivolous" posts I'm making here. I really intend for this blog to stay on topic (whatever that topic happens to be), so I promise I'll get out some new posts soon that make serious efforts to be worthwhile.

Introductory Post

The main purpose of this blog is to clarify my own thoughts by forcing myself to set them out in a more precise manner. Second, perhaps some of my thoughts/ruminations might be entertaining or edifying to others. Further, I would be happy to receive some helpful feedback/correction wherever it is warranted.

Please forgive me if I am not the most rigorous of writers--this is another thing which, I hope, writing things out in a blog will help to improve.

Expect: metaphysics, plus the philosophies of logic, language, and math, respectively (although I cannot claim to be very well versed in the latter fields). Also, an occasional bout of existential angst or angry rant about gender. Or whatever else strikes me as interesting.