The Upper Room

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Paul Vargas

9:47 AM

:-)

2 hours later…

Does Elisha speak?

12:04 PM

Q: Why was this closed for being "truthy" when it's anything but that?

So I asked this: Was Absalom's hair really that awesome? An objectively scientific question: can human hair be that big/strong? Yet it was put on hold for being a "Truthy/Is X a sin" question, and this was after I had already accepted a well received answer. What gives? Was the title throwing of...

5 hours later…

Does Elisha speak?

4:36 PM

Q: How do I view the Edit History?

I recently saw a link in a comment for the "Edit History" of a question. How do I view that history without someone posting a link to it in the Comments?

support

Matt Gutting

4:52 PM

@El'endiaStarman in respect of this, I can't remember the name of the scientist who in the mid-20th century (??) was asked by a newspaper

to write 1000 words about whether there was life on Mars. He wrote...

"Nobody knows, nobody knows, nobody knows..." 500 times.

El'endia Starman

Lol, nice. I've heard from elsewhere something like "A picture means a thousand words, yes, but your thousand words will be different from mine."

AJ Henderson

5:23 PM

@MattGutting my Dad did the opposite of that in high school

I forget what the paper was on, but he was asked to right a paper on some kind of philosophical concept

and he simply wrote "Why?" on the sheet of paper and handed it in

he received an A

(or I guess that really is kind of a similar thing)

Matt Gutting

@AJHenderson My favorite story, which is probably untrue, was of a philosophy class that was asked, as a final exam, "Prove that this chair [the teacher's chair] exists." One student simply looked blank, wrote "What chair?" and left the room.

David Stratton

5:43 PM

@curiousdannii on this question I deleted the comments going back and forth between you and the OP. However, I wanted to tell you that your comments would have been the start of an excellent answer. I'd just like to encourage you to post answers rather than quick comments that sort of answer the question but lead to an extended conversation.

Based on your comments, the answer would have been good.

El'endia Starman

@MattGutting And that reminds me of THIS: (Ctrl-F for "dynamic logic".)

> So in the first day of that class, Dr. Zuck filled up two entire whiteboards and quite a lot of the wall next to the whiteboards proving that if you have a light switch, and the light was off, and you flip the switch, the light will then be on. // The proof was insanely complicated, and very error-prone. It was harder to prove that the proof was correct than to convince yourself of the fact that switching a light switch turns on the light.

> ...it made me realize something: if it takes three hours of filling up blackboards to prove something trivial, allowing hundreds of opportunities for mistakes to slip in, this mechanism would never be able to prove things that are interesting.

2 hours later…

Does Elisha speak?

7:30 PM

Q: Is an answer that points out a false assumption in the question still an answer?

This answer, as @svidgen comments, is entirely accurate and correct, but doesn't answer the question asked. But the reason it doesn't answer the question asked is because (according to the text of the answer) the question is based on a false assumption, and thus cannot be answered as asked. Is t...

discussion

4 hours later…

fredsbend

11:23 PM

@El'endiaStarman My Highschool bio teacher, in an effort to justify the expense of a three day field trim to the Pacific Northwest Coast, would say "A picture is worth a thousand words. The real thing is worth a thousand pictures."

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