XPost: comp.theory, comp.lang.c++, comp.lang.c   
   From: polcott333@gmail.com   
      
   On 9/26/2025 1:01 PM, Richard Heathfield wrote:   
   > On 26/09/2025 18:17, olcott wrote:   
   >> 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.   
   >   
   > That isn't what I said. I said that for every PhD you can appeal to who   
   > doesn't understand the proof, there will be thousands who do understand   
   > the proof.   
   >   
      
   By showing that two PhD computer scientists agree   
   with my position makes it unreasonably implausible   
   that I am a mere crackpot.   
      
   >> 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.”   
   >   
   > We don't even have to do that, because there is no need to change our   
   > minds and the proof is already written.   
   >   
      
   In other words because you are sure that I must   
   be wrong there is no need to pay close attention   
   to what I say. Exactly the situation that paper   
   highlights.   
      
   > Contrary to what you appear to believe, a proof doesn't mean someone got   
   > it wrong. It means someone proved they're right.   
   >   
   >> 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.”   
   >   
   > You are the proof. The Halting Problem is remarkably simple, but as a   
      
   *The halting problem proof question is this*   
   What correct halt status value can be returned   
   when the input to a halt decider actually does   
   the opposite of whatever value is returned?   
      
   That part is simple and the not so simple part   
   is that it is incorrect two different ways.   
      
   > self-identified genius you are so sure it's mistaken that it has taken   
   > people 20 years to persuade you that DD proves HHH is not a halting   
   > decider for DD, even though it's never *once* got the answer right, and   
   > having briefly accepted it, you have already returned to your overturned   
   > bowl; I suppose 20 years is a hard habit to break.   
   >   
   >> What's going on here? Why don't facts change our minds?   
   >   
   > Like "DD halts", you mean?   
   >   
   >> And why would someone continue to believe a false or inaccurate idea   
   >> anyway?   
   >   
   > Because you're so full of it you can't get rid of it?   
   >   
   >   How do such behaviors serve us?   
   >   
   > They don't. You have pissed away 20 years.   
   >   
      
      
   --   
   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)