State a conjecture that some people here will initially believe to be false.

[Boojatta]

Prove that the conjecture is actually true. The proof itself should consist of at most four lines. In addition to the four lines, you may use an unlimited number of lines to introduce at most one term. For example, if lots of people aren't familiar with the term or if the term is potentially ambiguous, then it may require some explanation. You may use as many lines as necessary to help readers get familiar with the combination of ideas that appears in the definition and to ensure that your formulation of those ideas is very clear. However, the proof itself must be no more than four lines.

I offer this challenge because I get the impression that some participants in this forum think that a definition alone -- not in combination with any other ideas -- is all they need to arrive at a non-obvious conclusion.

[muriel_volestrangler]

1. Kicked and Recommended

Yes, many people won't believe I recommended a Boojatta thread, but if you look at the recommendation count above, you will see it reads (at least) one.

QED.

[Boojatta]

2. QED? Maybe you noticed that someone had recommended it...

and decided to have some fun. ;-)

[Meshuga]

5. The count is now 2

And I take credit for that second one. 3 more and you get to the greatest page. I didn't even get to read the OP so let me go see what I have just recommended.

[MannyGoldstein]

3. I'm Confused

Can you give an example? Would "Bill Clinton was the first president to make outsourced torture official US policy" serve as a conjecture to be proven?

[Boojatta]

4. No, the proof has to be basically self-contained.

To prove your conjecture would require gathering evidence or consulting a reference work.

You could probably prove within four lines that the sum of any two odd numbers is not odd. However, I trust/pray that the truth of this conjecture wouldn't surprise people here.

(There is no universally accepted reference work for questions of religion and theology.)

Note: I could have said "is even" rather than "is not odd", but remember that you get to define only one term. To play safe we might refrain from assuming that people know the meaning of the word "even."

New rule (not a restriction): you may introduce as many terms as you need to define your one term that you need to define. This rule is necessary because there's some vagueness about the question of what terms are available in ordinary vocabulary.

[SidDithers]

6. You go first...nt

Sid

[Boojatta]

8. Well, I doubt that it's possible. That's the point.

A lot of people underestimate the odds of two people in a gathering of a certain size having a birthday in common, but calculating that probability actually depends on a lot of assumptions. For example, you cannot assume that there's a uniform distribution of birthdays throughout the year, unless you can support that assumption.

You could try to put a restriction on how uneven the distribution can be in one country and then say that the gathering of people is "randomly selected" from the whole population of the country, but then the solution becomes more complicated and requires more defined terms, and people become less confident of their initial intuition. Of course, the more uneven the distribution, the higher the probability of there being a birthday in common. (The extreme case would be all births occurring on one particular day of the year). However, even mentioning this issue will put someone's intuition on the alert.

I think that one reason people underestimate the probability is that they think of picking one person and then seeing whether anyone else has that birthday, but that initial choice of one person restricts the number of possibilities. If you don't know when people were born, then for any given pair of people you don't know whether or not they have the same birthday. The number of pairs is proportional to the square of the size of the gathering. It's like the volume of a cylinder. Doubling the height just doubles the volume, but doubling the diameter multiplies the volume by four.

[Jim__]

7. Does the first one to do it win a prize? - n/t

[Boojatta]

9. I can offer my hearty congratulations. Others may offer more valuable prizes.

[edhopper]

10. While I like butter cream frosting

I am concerned with the use of uncooked egg-whites. Commercial bakeries use pasteurized eggs. But I cannot find them retail.

[Boojatta]

11. The following link may be of assistance to you.

Maybe of interest. Maybe not. There's no guarantee.

[Evoman]

12. Conjecture: your polls are inane.

Line 1: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=214x165279

Line 2: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=214&topic_id=163880&mesg_id=163880

Line 3: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=214&topic_id=159993&mesg_id=159993

Line 4: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=214x165291

Term to define "inane" -> 1) Lacking sense, significance, or ideas; silly: inane questions. 2) empty; void. 3) Boojatta poll.

[Jim__]

16. But does anyone here disagree with that conjecture?

[Boojatta]

17. A proof in effect shows the significance of assumptions.

You haven't stated any assumptions and I cannot think of any easily formulated common knowledge assumptions that you are relying on.

Your lines are not lines of a proof, but lines of references. The question at issue is the evaluation of the polls you referred to. Simply linking to them doesn't demonstrate that they have the quality you claim they have. Also, your conjecture "your polls are inane" is vague. Did you mean, "At least four of your polls are inane"?

[Zebedeo]

21. This fails to satisfy the first criterion

because no one here believes your conjecture to be false.

[Random_Australian]

13. I conjecture that you have no agenda behind this.

Step 1: The following sentence is untrue: "In the past, you've made polls such that you get info on some important topic, but everyone else is left in the dark."

Step 2: Because you have been so crystal clear, no-one has accused you of bieng a no-brainer poster of inane crap.

Step 3: Therefore, there is absolutely zero possibility that you would post something that would heavily imply that you had some kind of ulterior motive, and also you would never attempt to imply that it should be done that way. Even if you did, you would never try and do it using something between a false dichotomy and an assumption of binary opposition.

No, really. You wouldn't try and equivocate polls where only you know what is going on to the proper building, through discussion, a logical argument for something.

Therefore, there is an agendaless post designed with to promote innocuous discussion of that topic so vital to religion and theology: How many lines does it take to write something of meaning.

My guess: Forty-two.














Disclaimer: That was a bit snarky. :( But really, your polls piss me off.

[TZ]

14. .....

" That was a bit snarky. But really, your polls piss me off." I think right there, you have summed up what most of us feel....:rofl:

Looking forward to a response from Boojatta....:popcorn:

[Boojatta]

19. Re: Step 2

Step 2: Because you have been so crystal clear, no-one has accused you of being a no-brainer poster of inane crap.

I might be able to disprove that, depending on what you mean. If you mean merely that there does not exist a DU member who has both accused me (in writing) of being a no-brainer poster (the accusation not necessarily expressed in those words) and also accused me of posting inane crap (again, not necessarily in those words), but not necessarily with both accusations made in the same post, then it should be fairly easy for me to disprove it.

If I have to find both accusations in the same post, then it might not be possible. If I have to find both accusations posted in the Religion/Theology forum then it might require a lot of searching.

[Realityhack]

15. because most proofs can be stated in 4 lines? n/t

[Boojatta]

18. No, but this is about conclusions that are alleged to be obvious and "true by definition."

This is not about the kinds of conclusions that are reached by means of an average written proof.

In fact, I'm willing to consider a modification of the challenge. However, just how many lines can a proof have if you are going to claim that it's very obvious and doesn't even need to be written down? Ten? Twenty? Forty? A hundred?

[Realityhack]

22. I take it your real issue is:

"I offer this challenge because I get the impression that some participants in this forum think that a definition alone -- not in combination with any other ideas -- is all they need to arrive at a non-obvious conclusion."
And the 'challenge' is just an attempt to 'disprove' that assertion.

Unfortunately I think you are arguing with 'by definition' 'proofs' which is pretty much impossible.

example:
Person A: God is by definition perfect.
Person B: What about X event
Person A: That was a mistake (made by god)
Person B: That can not be a mistake because you defined god as being perfect. Either it is not a mistake or your definition is wrong.

Shortly followed by:
Boojatta: neither is wrong because I said so
Everyone else: Get a clue Boojatta.

[edhopper]

20. That Tiger Woods

is something, isn't he.

[Realityhack]

23. In D&D terms Boojatta would have an INT score greater than 0

Statement:
If Boojatta where made as a D&D character his Intelligence score would be greater than 0.
I think there are plenty of people here who would disagree at first glance.

Proof:
Boojatta is capable of stringing words together to form sentences (they may or may not be intelligent but they ARE sentences).
This ability has been demonstrated frequently enough that it is unlikely to be the result of random banging on the keyboard.
An intelligence score greater than 0 is required for this type of 'complex' communication.

Term to define D&D = Third edition Dungeons and Dragons.

I did it in 3.

[Dr. Strange]

24. The numbers you use to count with are crap!

First, I'll assume that everyone is familiar with the well-ordering property:

Every nonempty set of positive integers has a least element.

So, consider the set of all positive integers which can be described using fewer than 100 characters (a character being a letter, digit, or space). With only finitely many characters to work with, you can only describe finitely many integers. Let s be the smallest positive integer which cannot be described using fewer than one hundred characters. I just described it using less than one hundred characters. Contradiction.

Suck on it, logicists!

[Realityhack]

25. example/link please

...I get the impression that some participants in this forum think that a definition alone -- not in combination with any other ideas -- is all they need to arrive at a non-obvious conclusion."

What gives you that idea? Link, example please.

[Boojatta]

27. First I would need an assurance from the DU Administration

that it would not be considered "calling out."

[Realityhack]

28. really?

You can't point to a specific argument and say you think it displays a particular logical flaw on DU?

I'm tired of your games.

[bananas]

26. There's nothing in this post about religion or theology, so why is it here? nt