XPost: comp.theory, comp.lang.c++, comp.lang.c   
   From: polcott333@gmail.com   
      
   On 9/26/2025 12:05 PM, Richard Heathfield wrote:   
   > On 26/09/2025 16:56, olcott wrote:   
   >   
   >    
   >   
   >> Two other PhD computer scientists agree with me.   
   >   
   > That's an attempt at an appeal to authority, but it isn't a convincing   
   > argument. There must be many /thousands/ of Comp Sci PhDs who've studied   
   > the Halting Problem (for the 10 minutes it takes to drink a cup of   
   > coffee while they run the proof through their minds) and who have no   
   > problem with it whatsoever.   
   >   
      
   And of course you can dismiss whatever they say   
   without looking at a single word because majority   
   consensus have never been shown to be less than   
   totally infallible.   
      
      
   The economist J.K. Galbraith once wrote, “Faced with a choice between   
   changing one’s mind and proving there is no need to do so, almost   
   everyone gets busy with the proof.”   
      
   Leo Tolstoy was even bolder: “The most difficult subjects can be   
   explained to the most slow-witted man if he has not formed any idea of   
   them already; but the simplest thing cannot be made clear to the most   
   intelligent man if he is firmly persuaded that he knows already, without   
   a shadow of doubt, what is laid before him.”   
      
   What's going on here? Why don't facts change our minds? And why would   
   someone continue to believe a false or inaccurate idea anyway? How do   
   such behaviors serve us?   
      
   https://jamesclear.com/why-facts-dont-change-minds   
      
   --   
   Copyright 2025 Olcott "Talent hits a target no one else can hit; Genius   
   hits a target no one else can see." Arthur Schopenhauer   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)