The h Bar

DanielSank

04:00

I do think there's general understanding that the point of taxes is to fund things we want but that individuals will not be motivated to fund.

What fits the "we want" description may not be obvious.

0celo7

We would be motivated to fund them if there is value.

DanielSank

@0celo7 That is not true.

Dude, really? That's not true at all.

0celo7

Example?

ACuriousMind

@0celo7 ...where your definition of value is something we are motivated to fund?

DanielSank

@0celo7 Oh come on, man. Lots of people don't even understand saving for retirement. You think the average joe wants to contribute his fair share to the road?

0celo7

04:02

@ACuriousMind The market, of course. People decide.

I don't find those stupid hoverboards valuable, doesn't mean there isn't a market.

ACuriousMind

Adam Smith would be proud of you

DanielSank

@0celo7 Individual spending is not the same thing as building publicly useful stuff and you know it.

0celo7

@DanielSank Then average Joe doesn't get to drive on it.

It's quite simple.

DanielSank

@0celo7 really? How are you going to enforce that?

I build a road from here to LA. Some guy drives on it. How the crap do I even know he did that?

0celo7

Germans use speeding cameras. Same principle.

Maybe there are toll booths.

DanielSank

04:04

@0celo7 Uh uh... who reviews the cameras?

Who collects the outstanding fees?

dmckee

Privately financed tollways are a thing as close to you as Riverside.

0celo7

@DanielSank Replace everything you're saying with "IRS" and "taxes."

DanielSank

@0celo7 what?

ACuriousMind

@0celo7 Nice. From Libertarian Paradise to Authoritarian State in one message.

dmckee

Fastest way from Hemit to Disneyland.

DanielSank

04:05

Replace all the words I typed with "IRS"? That would lead to weird sentences.

0celo7

@ACuriousMind Not at all. There's no coercion.

DanielSank

@0celo7 Ok suppose you want drive to LA and there's no road to do it.

What do you do?

TanMath

Hello!

0celo7

YOU DONT

DanielSank

You're a physicist. You gunna build it?

TanMath

04:06

what are the new avatars?

0celo7

Why is this such a hard concept for people to grasp?

DanielSank

@0celo7 What's "this"?

0celo7

You're taking for granted things which were built by an immoral institution.

DanielSank

@0celo7 ..aaaaand we're done here.

0celo7

You're justifying the means (coercion) by the ends (driving on a road).

DanielSank

04:08

@0celo7 I have no idea what you're talking about. I didn't try to justify anything.

I am earnestly trying to understand how your dream land works in practice.

0celo7

Your defense of getting rid of the state is that there would be no road from LA to wherever, is it not?

DanielSank

I'm asking questions to get answers from you, not to imply any point of my own.

@0celo7 No, I'm trying to understand how you think this could work otherwise.

I suspect, strongly, that whatever you wind up saying will either be

0celo7

And I'm telling you that if there's no road from LA to wherever, you don't drive from LA to wherever.

DanielSank

1) Impractical because of how humans actually behave

2) government

@0celo7 Ok!

So, now I decide, I really want to go to LA!

0celo7

Take a helicopter, I don't know.

DanielSank

04:10

Cuz I don't know, it's valuable to me. I want a real bagel.

@0celo7 I don't have one!

0celo7

How do you want me to predict the future?

DanielSank

@0celo7 I want you to explain how you think the world would operate without government.

0celo7

I'm telling you it's irrelevant.

ACuriousMind

How people will actually fare is irrelevant?

0celo7

Nope. That is not a moral question. I'm sure there are all sorts of predictions which are all nice and well, but who knows?

"Who will build the roads" is the 21st century version of "Who will pick the cotton"

The answer is, quite simply, that it's irrelevant.

ACuriousMind

04:14

@0celo7 You're clearly not familiar with the long history of philosophical debates about the exact question whether or not how people will actually fare is maybe the only question that really matters.

0celo7

@ACuriousMind So what? It's not like anyone can answer that question.

ACuriousMind

@0celo7 Exactly. So why do you so confidently proclaim "That is not a moral question."?

0celo7

@ACuriousMind It's not.

knzhou

@0celo7 newyorker.com/humor/daily-shouts/…

0celo7

What exactly about it make it a moral question?

ACuriousMind

04:20

@0celo7 It is. Most consequentialist morals are based on judging the morality of a deed by its actual consequences.

DanielSank

Look @0celo7 the only interesting question is this: what happens when you put a bunch of unsocialized humans together amidst resources. The answer, as we know from experiment, is that the groups which form collective decision-making bodies wind up with more resources and erradicate the others.

There's a whole book on this.

0celo7

@knzhou Of course, the only cop is a scumbag.

Great article.

@ACuriousMind I'm fairly sure any AnCap philosophy is at odds with consequentialism.

ACuriousMind

@0celo7 That I'm fairly sure of, too

DanielSank

@0celo7 I'm still waiting for you to give me some indication of why you think governments are immoral...

knzhou

@0celo7 It's just satire, but it makes the same point as everybody is. In your world, what happens when you want to call the police?

0celo7

04:24

@DanielSank Taxation, wars, you name it.

Apparently we got 4 inches of snow.

DanielSank

@0celo7 Wow, you think without government there's no war?

0celo7

@DanielSank No.

DanielSank

Actually no you're right.

The people who don't form a collective body dedicated to collective defense are just killed by the people who do.

Yeah, you're right, the folks with no government don't have war. Good point.

'cuz they're dead.

You ought to read some evolutionary bio.

0celo7

So government provides for the common defense? That's it?

DanielSank

@0celo7 Among other things. It also provides things like roads so that citizens are able to conduct free commerce, which means more food, entertainment, and websites for all.

0celo7

04:30

@DanielSank Defense and roads? Boy, our government sure didn't get that memo.

In any case, we're straying from the point.

DanielSank

@0celo7 You're now joking, yes?

0celo7

@DanielSank Maybe. I'm not sure.

The question is why taxation is moral for the specific purpose of funding @ACuriousMind's gauge theory endeavors.

DanielSank

@0celo7 I never said it was.

Actually, I'm sure I didn't, because I would never use the word "moral".

At least, not without first establishing what we agree that word to mean.

0celo7

What would you say?

DanielSank

@0celo7 About what?

0celo7

04:36

@ACuriousMind I've seen an argument that says consequentialism is applicable within the AnCap framework if the situation is coerced. For instance, it is "alright" for an AnCap to advocate closing the borders to prevent tax increases, even though closing the borders in a stateless society would be the initiation of force.

@DanielSank Is it "alright" (define that how you wish) for ACM to get tax money for gauge theory funtimes?

ACuriousMind

@0celo7 ...wat. (Why would we even discuss "within the AnCap framework"?)

DanielSank

@0celo7 I think it's alright for a group of people to agree to a social contract and enforce it. If part of that contract involves a fund for science, and that some individual delegate that fund's resources, and that individual agrees to give @ACuriousMind some money, then yeah, it's all right.

Now, note that "individual" should probably not actually be one person.

0celo7

@ACuriousMind AnCap framework = universal principals

DanielSank

Furthermore, I would hope that everyone involved demands that all resource allocations be made public and subjected to scrutiny.

ACuriousMind

@0celo7 Now that's a very convenient definition, isn't it?

0celo7

04:39

@ACuriousMind What, because I haven't defined the principals?

DanielSank

See, in my book what's "all right" is defined by what works in the Darwinian sense, because I simply don't think there's any other possible basis for notions of morality.

0celo7

I'm not understanding your argument/objection, @ACuriousMind

ACuriousMind

@0celo7 Yes, but mostly because you haven't defined "universal"

0celo7

@ACuriousMind Something along the lines of "applicable to every moral agent"

DanielSank

@0celo7 What does "moral" mean?

I bet you $100 your definition doesn't work.

Mike Miller

04:44

DanielSank

@MikeMiller Oh that is good.

I might need to put that on the wall near my desk.

0celo7

@DanielSank We've come from shitty lectures to defining morality.

DanielSank

@MikeMiller One has to ask though... what were you thinking reading youtube comments?

Mike Miller

I weren't. It was linked to me.

0celo7

Also, I think $100 is immoral...I'm a poor college student.

DanielSank

04:45

@0celo7 Well, I think it's a good question to ask. You're using a word and I doubt you know what you mean by it.

ACuriousMind

@MikeMiller Ah, it was "a friend" who read them, right?

DanielSank

Heheheh.

Mike Miller

@ACuriousMind: I agree with the scare quotes, they're not much of a friend.

0celo7

@DanielSank Well I'm sure I could dig up a proper definition, but we'd be here for hours chasing words.

DanielSank

@0celo7 Forget proper. Give me even a basic notion of what you mean.

What's your guideline?

Religion? Experience? Math?

0celo7

04:47

Religion? What?

DanielSank

@0celo7 What informs your basic notion of "moral"?

0celo7

@DanielSank Universalizing the "standard" social rules.

@DanielSank Definitely not religion.

DanielSank

@0celo7 Standard where? In the US?

0celo7

@DanielSank Aggregate standards throughout history.

DanielSank

@0celo7 woof, so slavery is moral?

Slereah

04:49

@0celo7 Well gee we only talk about that theorem every day

We might as well call it the PSE theorem

0celo7

@DanielSank Nope.

DanielSank

@0celo7 Okay, so wanna revise?

0celo7

No.

DanielSank

Slavery was considered pretty normal all over the planet for centuries...

0celo7

@DanielSank Can you tell me a society where it was OK to enslave anyone you wanted to?

DanielSank

04:51

@0celo7 No, but I can think of a lot where it was ok to enslave the conquered, etc.

0celo7

Ok.

We take the "small truth" of "don't enslave your brother" and universalize it to "don't enslave your neighbor"

DanielSank

Ah.

0celo7

Rationally and consistently apply rules.

DanielSank

So your notion of "moral" is whatever behaviors I would want applied by my neighbors to myself, roughly?

Slereah

It was a thing during the bronze age middle east to sell your daughters into slavery

Ironically before money was invented

0celo7

04:52

@DanielSank I think I agree with that.

DanielSank

@0celo7 Ok cool. Yeah that's a pretty good definition IMHO.

What about cases where you can't universalize because e.g. you're male and you have opinions about treatment of females?

0celo7

Now I'm waiting for @ACuriousMind to tell me that I stole Kant's ideas

Approximately

@DanielSank I was just asking myself that. You'd have to say that women are not moral agents.

DanielSank

@0celo7 Sounds problematic.

0celo7

If someone is capable of committing an immorality, then they can be acted upon immorally

ACuriousMind

@0celo7 No. The "I would want applied [...] to myself" is decidedly un-Kantian

Slereah

04:56

Time to rape the candy thieves then

0celo7

Thus since it is immoral (presumable) to sell your sons into slavery, it is also immoral to sell your daughters

DanielSank

If we use ourselves as a reference point then we get stuck whenever we consider agents unlike ourselves.

This seems to be a very big problem, as we are surrounded by people unlike ourselves.

0celo7

@ACuriousMind The idea of universal principles originated with Kant, no?

Slereah

Kant also believed that space could only be Euclidian

Fuck Kant

Mike Miller

chill out bro

0celo7

04:57

i.e. if theft is universally moral, then the concept of theft breaks down

DanielSank

Interestingly, your idea about not having government does seem like something someone used to only living with people like themselves would think is a good idea...

I don't meant that as an insult. Sorry.

It's just that this sort of idea does seem much more common among those who are not used to living e.g. in large cities.

0celo7

@DanielSank Dunno, I grew up in 5,6 states and two countries.

ACuriousMind

@0celo7 The idea of "universal principles" is probably pre-Socratic. The Kantian idea of "categorical truths" originated with Kant.

DanielSank

@0celo7 Cool! Can you imagine living in a city without a government?

Yikes!

0celo7

Not an argument ;)

DanielSank

05:00

@0celo7 eh?

0celo7

@DanielSank Ok, was that intended to be an argument?

DanielSank

@0celo7 Not really. It was an appeal for you to imagine a situation to inform subsequent discussion.

0celo7

I can't imagine it.

(That's not a value statement, I literally cannot imagine it.)

DanielSank

Ok.

Seems to me like it's impossible by construction.

0celo7

What is?

DanielSank

05:03

Some of the people would start making collective decisions and then you have a government.

0celo7

Unless they're taxing, it's not a government.

DanielSank

@0celo7 Uhhh, that's an interesting point of view.

But in any case I bet you'd always get taxing.

I mean, consider even a small family.

0celo7

Are they initiating force in any way?

(this group)

DanielSank

@0celo7 Assuming these are real human beings, yes, there is probably eventually going to be some kind of enforcement of rules.

I suppose it's possible to do without, but my guess is that those groups don't fare well.

0celo7

@DanielSank Ok, then the people are justified in revolting.

DanielSank

05:06

@0celo7 What does that have to do with anything?

Yeah sure, people are always allowed to stick up for themselves etc. etc.

0celo7

But I fail to see your point here. Are you taking a Hobbes approach (ACM buttblast incoming) that people will do immoral things anyway, so we might as well have a government?

DanielSank

@0celo7 No, I'm taking a Darwin/Dawkins approach that you should look at the world and understand why it is how it is before you try to make judgements about what's "right".

Also that what's "right" is by definition what survives.

0celo7

@DanielSank Cannibalism is moral?

DanielSank

@0celo7 I'm not sure my notion of morality really has much to say about cannibalism. Interestingly, it's not a great idea in terms of a group's survival.

Easy to get sick because you're eating flesh containing the same germs that can make you sick.

ACuriousMind

See now in the h bar: Duel of the Strawmen

DanielSank

05:09

@ACuriousMind Oh?

I missed it. Where is it?

Seriously.

0celo7

Yeah, where?

ACuriousMind

@DanielSank You think that discussing the morality of cannibalism has something to do with the initial question of whether government and taxation are moral?

0celo7

@ACuriousMind Dude we're just having fun at this point

Let it go, prove some theorems or whatever

I just realized I confused the words for strawman and sockpuppet ;/

DanielSank

@ACuriousMind I have no idea. I didn't bring up cannibalism...

0celo7

@DanielSank You brought up Darwinism

DanielSank

05:12

@ACuriousMind was your point that @0celo7 is making straw men?

@0celo7 And?

0celo7

@DanielSank If you're going to argue that any moral system besides Darwinism is wrong...then there's nothing to talk about. Darwinism allows for cannibalism.

DanielSank

@0celo7 I do not understand the link between those two sentences.

0celo7

@DanielSank I don't either.

The thought kind of floated way...

DanielSank

@0celo7 Gee, thanks.

0celo7

@ACuriousMind How are you still up??

I'm getting tired D:

Is it light in Germany?

Eh...6AM. Probably not.

@DanielSank Ok. "Do not steal from your neighbor" is something we all know, it has never been allowed. It's one of those "aggregate morals" I was talking about earlier. Universalized, it is immoral for the IRS (or whoever) to steal (tax) from me and you. If you don't accept that, fine, but I'm done discussing for now.

I had intended to do analysis proofs tonight...

DanielSank

05:18

@0celo7 The implicit congruence of "steal" and "levy taxes" is so obviously not a given that I'm a little annoyed you'd even try that.

That level of debate is worthy of kindergarten and Fox News.

0celo7

Ok.

FenderLesPaul

Timelike congruence

0celo7

@FenderLesPaul What about it

FenderLesPaul

nothing

0celo7

@DanielSank Maybe I should put on the bottom of the post a section that reviews isomorphisms, vector spaces (the axioms), linear operators, and notation like $f:V\times V\to W$

DanielSank

05:26

@0celo7 I think you're ok wrt vector spaces.

We know what those are.

0celo7

Isomorphism?

DanielSank

@0celo7 The word is probably not familiar to most.

0celo7

::jaw drops:: Not trying to be a dick.

DanielSank

Can't you just say "... one-to-one mapping (i.e. isomorphism)..." thus making everyone happy?

0celo7

Is it not standard for physics majors to take a course on analysis?

DanielSank

05:30

@0celo7 Hell no.

0celo7

@DanielSank Ont-to-one and onto.

DanielSank

@0celo7 Right right.

0celo7

@DanielSank I'm really not trying to be a dick here, but how do they expect to take GR, QM, QFT without basic math?

Take analysis in grad school?

DanielSank

@0celo7 Because you don't need the formal definitions to understand what's going on.

@0celo7 I took it as an undergrad. As I said, I am unusually mathematically oriented.

Hardest class I took, actually.

0celo7

@DanielSank I would say you do need it for GR...

DanielSank

05:33

I didn't use analysis in GR course...

I gotta go

ciao

0celo7

Did you prove the theorems of Hawking, Prenrose and Choquet-Bruhat?

@DanielSank Bye.

Slereah

07:56

" However, this triggers a new – and frightening – obstacle: at nonlinear level there (generically) arises a massive, ghost, 6th degree of freedom beyond the 2s+1=5 of FP–the so-called Boulware-Deser (BD) ghost."

The most frightening of ghosts

user303542

A "ghost" by any other name is still just a ghost ;-)

Just like the "ghosts" of departed quantities.

Slereah

boooo I am the ghost of gauge invariance

user303542

Who you gonna call?

Slereah

Did u know that the energy of the ghost term is compensated by the energy of the gauge fixing term

It is neat

not terribly surprising but still

user303542

08:15

Ghost busters

True, it's not surprising that a ghost buster is around whenever a ghost shows up ;-)

yuggib

12:02

@ACuriousMind One point, related to the above discussion, would be that a mathematician is much less expensive in equipment than other scientists

And the talks of mathematicians are usually good, and done in the proper way: a piece of chalk and a (possibly gigantic) blackboard

@Danu Are you in LMU or TUM?

Slereah

TUM sounds like the nickname of a fat kid

Mister tum

guest

@yuggib is it just a matter of opinion that mathematics has a higher mental expenditure than the sciences?

yuggib

I was talking about expenses in equipment such as computers, lab stuff, etc.

Slereah

Well math guys also need computers

yuggib

yes, but that's it

Slereah

12:12

Also books

yuggib

yeah, but that's in common with all other sciences, and in addition mathematicians require less powerful computers usually

Slereah

Theoretical physicists don't require much more, really

yuggib

well, they usually do more computations on average

Slereah

Do they

Plenty of theory papers are all pen and paper calculations

yuggib

in my experience, yes

try to make a statistical analysis

guest

12:18

Oooh noo NOT stats :-D

yuggib

:-D

it is something a physicist would do; statistical analysis of the data

with a powerful enough computing machine

that has in its lab

Slereah

Statistical analysis is for suckers

just solve some metrics or something

Let's make a spacetime guys

Let's say

yuggib

relativity is like geometry (in fact, they're related): boring

Slereah

Spherically symmetric

$g_{rr} = A(r^2 + 12)$

Where A is the Airy function

Bam, a new paper is made

yuggib

go and do it, I'll leave you the exclusive

with immense pleasure

Slereah

12:23

So it turns out the stress energy tensor describes exactly the matter field of a muffin

Which is strange, since muffins are not spherically symmetric

I wonder if there's a Default Paper that you can write in such and such discipline

Like a paper you can do when you have no other idea

Solve an integral, solve a PDE, solve some metric, do some QFT at the n-th order

Nothing too important, just publish or perish

yuggib

if you are willing to pay, a random generated paper can be accepted in some open access journals

Slereah

not randomly generated

Just not a very original one

The equivalent of a science fair paper mache volcano

yuggib

do a review paper

Slereah

Are there any papers on paper mache volcano

Good idea

yuggib

maybe

Slereah

12:27

I'll become a PAPER CRITIC

Maybe I'll do hilarious youtube reviews of papers

My shtick will be criticizing poorly done bibliographies

yuggib

@Slereah that's a possibility, but I was meaning a paper that reviews a certain field/subject

Slereah

Are those the papers that start with "An introduction to" or "On"

yuggib

@Slereah anyway in math, reviews of papers already exist

they're called the mathscinet or zbmath

@Slereah exactly

Slereah

Those are p. good

Especially topics without any books

yuggib

you don't need originality to do them, but a good and updated knowledge of the subject

maybe in the end they're not so easy...

they give an 8$ bonus per review to use on books/other AMS activities if you do reviews for the mathscinet

Slereah

12:31

@yuggib Depends how much you like the topic, I suppose

I'm supposed to read some big documentation for work currently

yuggib

@Slereah it's more a matter of how good you have understood it

Slereah

On multiscreen applications

And good god it's a chore

I barely understand it

yuggib

sounds more boring than relativity

Slereah

Yeah

I'd rather read Jaffe and what's his name than this

Glimm

Gollum

Glam?

Gromm

yuggib

I'd stay with the first

;-P

Slereah

12:36

Jaffe is a bit of a chore to read too but at least it's interesting

Really I'm not quite sure what QFT book I really like

It's hard to find one that is both pleasant to read and that contains good informations

Usually I stick with Peskin

It's a good middle ground

Slereah

12:56

I should do some dumb old scattering calculations

I haven't done any in like 5 years

0celo7

Can't flim flam the Glim Glam

Slereah

Can't scald the Wald

0celo7

Can't straw man the Straumann

Slereah

Can't troll the Carroll

0celo7

Can't shill the Hill

0537

13:11

why are you doing this?

Slereah

I blame society

guest

I blame history

0celo7

Can't Yahtzee the Lee

0537

@0celo7 reminds me you forgot zee.

0celo7

Can't key the Zee

Can't sperg the Goldberg

guest

13:18

U Can't touch this

0537

lol what did that say?

0celo7

Can't make darker the Parker

0537

also does anyone know alternatives to jackson's em book?

guest

MC Hammer - U Can't Touch This

►

0celo7

Can't touch the Hammer

guest

13:19

Hammer time

Slereah

Can't hammer the Dahmer

yuggib

@Slereah for the physics part, I stick with Weinberg; for the math part with (second quantization) Derezinski-Gérard and (functional integral) Glimm-Jaffe

Slereah

Weinberg kinda takes forever to get to the point

yuggib

@0537 Landau vol.2?

Slereah

It takes like 5 chapters to even get to some equations

yuggib

13:31

@Slereah yeah, but it is fairly comprehensive

Slereah

It is

Maybe not too pedagogical, though

Feynman does nice books full of great trivia but it is overall pretty shit

Goes in all directions

0537

13:46

@yuggib I looked and landau and I did not like it.

Slereah

Can't Spandau the Landau

Jackson is pretty much the only reference for EM you ever hear

I would almost forgive the Trail of Tears for this opus on EM

0celo7

What

Slereah

Andrew Jackson

Andrew Jackson (March 15, 1767 – June 8, 1845) was the seventh President of the United States (1829–1837). He was born near the end of the colonial era, somewhere near the then-unmarked border between North and South Carolina, into a recently immigrated Scots-Irish farming family of relatively modest means. During the American Revolutionary War Jackson, whose family supported the revolutionary cause, acted as a courier. He was captured, at age 13, and mistreated by his British captors. He later became a lawyer. He was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, and then to the U.S. Senate. In...

0celo7

@yuggib Weinberg is a mess. He doesn't explain projective representations at all and his explanation of the Cluster Decomposition Principle is shameful.

@Slereah Ah, the best president.

Slereah

Ironically we too have a president with a physicist name

Sadi Carnot was both a French president and a thermodynamics guy

Same family, apparently

0celo7

13:57

Carnot was an engineer.

yuggib

@0celo7 both does not seem so important to me

Transcript for