Timeline for James Bennett

Includes recent activities performed by James Bennett.

30 December 2008

Avatar

Reading list Night Watch

Terry Pratchett's novels of Sam Vimes and the Ankh-Morpork Night Watch (later City Watch), in chronological order. Created 6 days, 10 hours ago

17 December 2008

Cover Avatar

Page 129  

ubernostrum: finished reading Godel's Proof 2 weeks, 5 days ago

16 December 2008

Cover Avatar

Page 320  

ubernostrum: finished reading Unended Quest 2 weeks, 6 days ago

Cover Avatar

Page 160  

ubernostrum: finished reading Kuhn vs. Popper 2 weeks, 6 days ago

Cover Avatar

Page 17   of 129

ubernostrum: read 17 pages of Godel's Proof 2 weeks, 6 days ago

13 September 2008

Cover Avatar

Page 960   of 960

ubernostrum: read 303 pages of Anathem 3 months, 3 weeks ago

Cover Avatar

ubernostrum: Waiting to see how this turns out before I post any further annotations; I'm deep into spoiler territory now. Comment 3 months, 3 weeks ago for Anathem

Cover Avatar

Page 657   of 960

ubernostrum: read 319 pages of Anathem 3 months, 3 weeks ago

12 September 2008

Cover Avatar

Page 338   of 960

ubernostrum: read 30 pages of Anathem 3 months, 3 weeks ago

Cover Avatar

ubernostrum: Arsibalt's explanation of "Sconic thought" is a decent enough summary of some of the problems explored by Kant in the Critique of Pure Reason, regarding both the fact that we cannot directly access knowledge concerning the world outside our heads, ... Comment 3 months, 3 weeks ago for Anathem

Cover Avatar

Page 308   of 960

ubernostrum: read 37 pages of Anathem 3 months, 3 weeks ago

Cover Avatar

ubernostrum: Arsibalt's lecture here brings to mind philosophical debates about the metaphysics of propositions, namely whether they can be said to exist regardless of the tokens (words, symbols, etc.) used to express them. Which returns to the problem of universals, and ... Note 3 months, 3 weeks ago for Anathem

Cover Avatar

ubernostrum: Saunt Mandarast may be an analogue of Frank Drake, famous for his equation. Note 3 months, 3 weeks ago for Anathem

Cover Avatar

ubernostrum: And we get into spoiler territory again: this sort of thing has actually been theorized about, as part of the first and now-defunct Project Orion. Note 3 months, 3 weeks ago for Anathem

Cover Avatar

ubernostrum: Familiar ground; Stephenson is wandering near to a lot of material I covered when I was doing my thesis. Since I could talk for days about this stuff, I'll compensate by keeping my notes here extremely short. The arguments for ... Comment 3 months, 3 weeks ago for Anathem

Cover Avatar

ubernostrum: The many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics posits that there is essentially a huge number of "universes", one for each possible outcome of each collapse of each quantum waveform throughout history (more colloquially expressed as the idea that "everything which can ... Comment 3 months, 3 weeks ago for Anathem

Cover Avatar

ubernostrum: In the twentieth century, the branch known as philosophy of science became increasingly concerned with the problem of demarcation, separating things which were science from things which were not. Mainstream English-speaking philosophy picked up on this as well, and a ... Comment 3 months, 3 weeks ago for Anathem

Cover Avatar

Page 271   of 960

ubernostrum: read 69 pages of Anathem 3 months, 3 weeks ago

11 September 2008

Cover Avatar

Page 202   of 960

ubernostrum: read 20 pages of Anathem 3 months, 3 weeks ago

Cover Avatar

ubernostrum: Logos strikes again, this time in a slightly more obvious form (the "action principle" Erasmas alludes to). Aristotle on causality may be helpful reading to see the underlying ideas. Comment 3 months, 3 weeks ago for Anathem