A Compendium of Sklansky Fallacies

[David Sklansky]

Ok. Read your your post. I am not quite sure where I lied but perhaps I did. Here is the truth. Anyone who believes that a a belief in Jesus is probably a necessary and sufficient condition to escape hell is far less likely to be brilliant than those who believe otherwise. At least ten times less likely. Maybe 100 times less likely.

One way to measure that would be the math SAT taken in half the time. When I was younger I could ace it in a fifth of the time. So I would say I'm at least 98% to do it in half the time now. So would perhaps 50,000 other Americans. Since about ten percent of the population is ultra Chrisitan you would expect 5000 of them to be 98% as well. But I'm guessing there is less than 100. Meanwhile there figured to be many thousand of these Christians who were well below 98% who might have taken me up on my challenge. Unless someone wised them up. Like you did. Once that happenned, my only challengers would come from that top 100. So it wasn't worth it.

But that doesn't change the fact that these Christians are indeed much less likely to be brilliant.

[felson]

[ QUOTE ]
Ok. Read your your post. I am not quite sure where I lied but perhaps I did.

[/ QUOTE ]

How many times do I have to spell this out for you? Here are two simple lies that are irrefutable. Both are taken from the two links in my post above.

1. You withdraw the challenge. Months later, someone asks, and you say it still stands. Then when I ask about it, you say that you remember withdrawing it. Huh?

2. At the time that you withdrew the challenge, you say that it is done because you fear the "exquisitely rare fundamentalist" genius. Later, you say that you withdrew it "not because there was an actual taker I was trying to avoid."

Frankly, these lies are so blatant, dumb, and pointless that I can only assume that they were not intentional. Then again, no smart person should be capable of such errors.

David, how do you explain this?

p.s. I'm setting aside the rest of your post for the time being, because it's not relevant to my original post in this thread. Please restrict your attention to the points above, at least for now.

[David Sklansky]

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[ QUOTE ]
Ok. Read your your post. I am not quite sure where I lied but perhaps I did.

[/ QUOTE ]

How many times do I have to spell this out for you? Here are two simple lies that are irrefutable. Both are taken from the two links in my post above.

1. You withdraw the challenge. Months later, someone asks, and you say it still stands. Then when I ask about it, you say that you remember withdrawing it. Huh?

2. At the time that you withdrew the challenge, you say that it is done because you fear the "exquisitely rare fundamentalist" genius. Later, you say that you withdrew it "not because there was an actual taker I was trying to avoid."

Frankly, these lies are so blatant, dumb, and pointless that I can only assume that they were not intentional. Then again, no smart person should be capable of such errors.

David, how do you explain this?

p.s. I'm setting aside the rest of your post for the time being, because it's not relevant to my original post in this thread. Please restrict your attention to the points above, at least for now.

[/ QUOTE ]

You are parsing words too meticulously in order to accuse me of lying.

I withdrew the offer for the reasons given. Later on I said the offer still stands. I should have written "even though I officially withdrew the offer I think I will reinstate it rather than have people think I seriously worry about getting beat." If I had phrased it that way you would have not called me a liar, I assume.

Of course the offer was flawed from the beginning. Because there are a very tiny number of Fundamentalist Christians who are as good as I presently figure to be on the math SAT. And once you warned away merely excellent Christian mathmeticians, only those few freaks would conceivably challenge me. Thus I would not only waste my time, but I would be a party to a challenge that would erroneously seem to disprove my point. Which again is that of the top 100,000 or so of the most scientifically brilliant thinkers, ultra Christians are represented in numbers far, far below their population percentages. (And thats something I really do wish I could bet on.)

[felson]

David,

1. Does the offer stand? Yes or no, please.

2. Would you or would you not "seriously worry about getting beat"? Yes or no.

As for the rest, I already told you not to worry about it for now. When you are not clear about even the simplest questions, I refuse to give you my attention on more important matters.

But I will say two things:

A. When you offered your challenge, I quickly pointed out its fundamental flaws. You refused to admit them for quite some time. Regardless of your motivation, that behavior is not worthy of respect.

B. If you really thought there was a good chance that no one would point out that the math SAT is probably a joke to you, then you are dumber than I thought. Lots of people exposed your ploy. I was just the most vocal.

[David Sklansky]

[ QUOTE ]
David,

1. Does the offer stand? Yes or no, please.

2. Would you or would you not "seriously worry about getting beat"? Yes or no.

As for the rest, I already told you not to worry about it for now. When you are not clear about even the simplest questions, I refuse to give you my attention on more important matters.

But I will say two things:

A. When you offered your challenge, I quickly pointed out its fundamental flaws. You refused to admit them for quite some time. Regardless of your motivation, that behavior is not worthy of respect.

B. If you really thought there was a good chance that no one would point out that the math SAT is probably a joke to you, then you are dumber than I thought. Lots of people exposed your ploy. I was just the most vocal.

[/ QUOTE ]

Offer doesn't stand. You are obviously pressing this issue because there's some flukey Fundamentalist willing to give you a freeroll. But I will lay 50K to 25K that I can get an 800.

[felson]

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[ QUOTE ]
David,

1. Does the offer stand? Yes or no, please.

2. Would you or would you not "seriously worry about getting beat"? Yes or no.

As for the rest, I already told you not to worry about it for now. When you are not clear about even the simplest questions, I refuse to give you my attention on more important matters.

But I will say two things:

A. When you offered your challenge, I quickly pointed out its fundamental flaws. You refused to admit them for quite some time. Regardless of your motivation, that behavior is not worthy of respect.

B. If you really thought there was a good chance that no one would point out that the math SAT is probably a joke to you, then you are dumber than I thought. Lots of people exposed your ploy. I was just the most vocal.

[/ QUOTE ]

Offer doesn't stand. You are obviously pressing this issue because there's some flukey Fundamentalist willing to give you a freeroll. But I will lay 50K to 25K that I can get an 800.

[/ QUOTE ]

Wow, you really are obtuse. I have no such plans. In the meantime, please answer my questions.

edit: actually, you did answer #1.

And I take it that the answer to #2 is "yes, I would worry." That makes me laugh since you said earlier that you didn't want people to believe that you would worry, but whatever.

Do you have anything to say regarding my comments A and B?

[Lestat]

<font color="blue">Offer doesn't stand. You are obviously pressing this issue because there's some flukey Fundamentalist willing to give you a freeroll. But I will lay 50K to 25K that I can get an 800. </font>

Why do you have to be a central figure anyway? If I understand your original point, this isn't about how smart YOU are.

Simply offer to bet any fundamentalist that your 5, 10, 20, or 50 secularists will average a higher score on an SAT than his 5, 10, 20, or 50 fundamentalists. Require a letter from each participant's priest or clergyman stating he has attended at least 1 mass in the last two months.

Your original point is right, but I hate the way you're going about proving it. You seem to be making this a "look how smart I am" bet. Such a bet as it pertains to what you claim to be your objective point, shouldn't be that hard to get off (if the money is right).

[jason1990]

Newton did calculus with limits. Leibniz did calculus with infinitesimals. Neither did it rigorously. Leibniz's infinitesimals were much more complicated than you seem to think they were. There were first order infinitesimals, smaller than any positive number, second order infinitesimals, smaller than any first order infinitesimal, and so on. Even though it was non-rigorous, it was still a complicated affair.

And the "standard" method of teaching freshman calculus is with non-rigorous limits. Epsilons and deltas are typically reserved for advanced classes or honors students. What you have described as "your" method actually sounds a lot like the standard method.

[borisp]

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And the "standard" method of teaching freshman calculus is with non-rigorous limits.

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How much experience do you have actually teaching freshman calculus? I bet it is very little, if any at all.

How do I know this? I read what you write.

And, completely off topic, for jasonblahblahblah, my specific attack against Jensen's logical probability is that desiderata I and IIIc are inconsistent, in light of the axiom of choice. Further, desideratum IIIb is not constructible, without the axiom of choice.

But keep studying logical probability, if it makes you feel smart. I wonder why this subject hasn't received major attention in the mathematics community, even though these philosophers perform calculations in Kolmogorov's measure theoretic frameowork (holy [censored] those are some big words)?? Hmmmm...maybe it's because this framework requires demonstration of the existence of a function that "behaves like probability," before any meaningful conclusions can be drawn. And maybe the entire field has very conveniently ignored the NONexistence of such a function.

[borisp]

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Stop getting so technical on me.

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Sorry Dave, but math is technical.

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Do you disagree with the following:

Newton and Leibniz calculated derivatives by at first pretending that the slight increase in x and y was finite and then when they were done called the increase zero. Or something along those lines.

Some mathmeticians found that technique logically unrigorous and set about getting the same answers using reasoning involving epsilons and a rigorous definition of limits. Or something along those lines.

First yeatr calculus students have more trouble with this second technique.

Abraham Robinson showed that Leibniz and Newton's logic was in fact not unrigorous.

[/ QUOTE ]
What I am certain of is that this is an UNreasonably vague description of the relevant mathematical processes. While it no doubt suffices to help YOU remember the details of calculus, it is in no way useful to the general student. My examples in the previous post were an attempt to point this out.

Keep in mind that the goal of mathematics is not necessarily understanding, but communication. From the perspective of one who has spent his or her life profiting solely from trivial mathematical knowledge, this may not be so clear.

Edit: and I will take any math test, at any time, for any amount of money that is affordable (meaning that if it got serious then I bet I could get backers, and so on)...just to show how stupid you are. You (David "smarter than a perfect probability machine" Sklansky) above all others would benefit from this experience.

God bless the internet.