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1 BCS (0:05 - 1:30)
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2
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3 If we talk about, not only about Sussman @?, but let's say, and what
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4 he meant by empirical or something, but just we talk about, well, the
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5 things we're talking about, the three parts, the base model, the Delta
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6 that turns it into a question answering machine, and the prompt
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7 engineering that turns a particular prompt into a particular prompt,
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8 basically, particular question into a particular prompt, say. And we
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9 talk for half an hour about that, and we end up using the word prompt
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10 for that which the third part of our tripartite distinction has turned
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11 a question into.
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12
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13 That's right.
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14
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15 HST (1:31 - 1:33)
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16
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17 Yeah. So far, so good.
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18
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19 BCS (1:35 - 2:35)
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20
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21 What prompt means in our discourse at that moment is not something
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22 that necessarily could be propositionally expressed, even though I
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23 just used words to communicate it with you about it. But there's no
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24 reason to suspect the kinds of understanding that I can evoke with
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25 things like early Pereira or something should actually have, well, the
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26 form of articulation that we assume propositions have. So, I don't
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27 think, and, you know, take poetry as a kind of limit example.
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28
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29 HST (2:36 - 2:36)
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30
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31 Yeah.
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32
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33 BCS (2:36 - 3:10)
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34
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35 I don't think there's any reason to suspect that the understanding
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36 process is ever, I mean, I think something needs to be said about
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37 articulation in the original sense of being hinged. But I guess poetry
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38 is unhinged.
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39
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40 HST (3:13 - 5:36)
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41
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42 So, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, who was a
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43 prodigious intellect, ... wrote a book and gave a lecture, a series of
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44 lectures, a series of lectures, possibly even Gifford lectures, about
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45 the necessity of poetic discourse in the face of the divine, the
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46 infinite, whatever, what he had spent his life
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47 promulgating, you could almost view it, at
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48 the end of his time in that role, a sort of _apologia pro vita
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49 sua_. [Regarding] the creed, which attempts to be
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50 wholly explicit about something, which he in the end feels it's
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51 impossible to be even usefully explicit, much less wholly
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52 explicit.
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53
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54 And of course, you know, illustrated by lots of good, impenetrable,
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55 more or less penetrable poetry. You never know where you're going to
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56 find somebody trying to share the same thought.
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57
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58 BCS (5:39 - 5:53)
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59
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60 Well, I mean, this conversation we're having is a good example of what
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61 does poetry mean, right? We've already bent it like a, yeah, like a
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62 string on an electric guitar.
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63
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64 HST (5:55 - 6:56)
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65
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66 But that's what language is good for. This is
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67 Robin Cooper's
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68 point that it's fundamental to the success of language, that what you
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69 understand by what I say is not what I meant by it. I'm exaggerating
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70 only slightly, right?
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71
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72 He used to give a critique of the so-called conduit metaphor, saying
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73 that it's not just unhelpful, it's incoherent.
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74
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75 You can't take whatever my mental structures are and inject them into
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76 somebody else's brain by any means and get any useful results.
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77
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78 BCS (6:57 - 7:16)
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79
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80 It's actually interesting because you could write a short story on,
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81 maybe science fiction, I don't know, um, on what would evolution have
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82 looked like if our spinal cords came to the surface.
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83
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84 HST (7:17 - 7:47)
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85
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86 Right. Well, and I think that there are many people who think that,
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87 that once we, once we have a 38 pin socket at the base of our spinal
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88 cord, um, that turning a vat produced body into me is just a matter of
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89 cabling the one up into the other.
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90
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91 BCS (7:47 - 7:49)
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92
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93 Right. With, with high bandwidth.
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94
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95 HST (7:49 - 7:56)
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96
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97 With high bandwidth and whatever the neural equivalent, neural
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98 equivalent of rsync is.
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99
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100 BCS (7:56 - 8:34)
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101
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102 Right. But it's interesting because one of the things that I think
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103 that deep learning folks have realized is that populating levels with
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104 arbitrary numbers of neurons or fake neurons or whatever, isn't always
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105 helpful. The reduction in number of neurons on a given level is often
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106 necessary in order to force the abstraction, basically.
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107
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108 BCS (8:42 - 8:51)
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109
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110 I'm not sure I've heard it before, but that's certainly what I take: @?
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111 The fact that these things collapse, if they have too many
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112 neurons.
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113
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114 HST (8:51 - 9:09)
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115
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116 You can always throw more data in, but you can't just throw more
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117 layers or nodes in the layers without some more architecture.
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118
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119 BCS (9:10 - 9:16)
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120
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121 That's right. Because it actually, it's not that it won't get any
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122 better. It'll actually get worse.
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123
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124 HST (9:17 - 9:24)
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125
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126 I think I would say, because it will never converge.
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127
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128 BCS (9:25 - 9:27)
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129
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130 Never converge. That's what I meant to say. Yeah.
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131
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132 HST (9:27 - 9:41)
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133
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134 There's not enough pressure on the channel,
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135 To make it effective in the coding required.
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136
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137 BCS (9:41 - 9:42)
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138
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139 Right.
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140
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141 BCS (9:48 - 10:23)
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142
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143 So let's go back to the question is @? whether the metaphysical
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144 story, which might be actually just a more successful version of
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145 the anthropic principle. I don't know.
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146
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147 So anyway, I'm not going to use it [the anthropic principal] anymore.
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148
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149 HST (10:24 - 10:33)
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150
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151 I introduced it only because it's a shorthand for a line of thought.
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152
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153 BCS (10:33 - 10:37)
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154
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155 Yeah ... which has gone astray, I think.
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156
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157 ...
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158
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159 BCS (10:46 - 13:52)
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160
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161 The metaphysical question. I'm starting over. I have said that we are
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162 in, of, and about the world.
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163
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164 And the in and of are pretty serious facts. And it's funny writing
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165 about reflection, even though I'm not writing about reflection. But
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166 I'm kind of writing about, well, I'm writing about what I'm writing
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167 about the fundamental notion of computing as revealed by looking at
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168 reflection.
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169
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170 And the reason reflection is such a salutary example is that, you
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171 know, I take computation to be a dialectic of meaning and mechanism (to
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172 refer to the other book that I want to write). It both represents and
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173 does. And, but crucially, it represents and does. @delete one?@
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174
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175 And it needs to represent its representation, it needs to represent
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176 its doing, and it needs to be able to do what it represents itself as
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177 doing and whatever. It exemplifies, and it's both part
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178 of its properties, it exemplifies the properties that can represent,
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179 which forces a certain kind of discipline on it. And that fact
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180 about reflection reflection @? is, is related to [pause?@] I mean, I feel now as
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181 if I'm instantiating this idea that the layers need fewer neurons,
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182 because I'm losing neurons at a rate that's forcing everything into
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183 being the same thing.
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184
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185 But that fact about us being here and representing being here, and
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186 what the constraints on that are, is a pretty serious fact about how
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187 we think, I think. And I think the ontological facts that the use of
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188 differential equations in physics represents, which are never given a
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189 name, but that's what I think they, the deixis sort of is, is just one
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190 of the things that is pushed on us. That's a funny use of the word
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191 push, but it's one of the things we're, we're not normatively
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192 accountable to, we just are bluntly accountable to.
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193
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194 HST (13:52 - 13:55)
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195
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196 Yeah, we're obliged by, we're obliged @?, much better circumstance.
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197
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198 BCS (13:56 - 13:57)
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199
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200 Thank you, yeah, we're obliged.
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201
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202 HST (14:01 - 15:32)
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203
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204 [edit this heavily @?]
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205
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206 So that, I think that, that claim that you just uttered, I don't
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207 understand. And I think elucidating it, and maybe the elucidation is
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208 in the objects book if I went back and found it, but it's not, but,
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209 but I think it's necessary if you want to, I mean, the problem is at
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210 the, at the purely sort of tactical level, whether the, whether it's
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211 necessary to take 10 or 15 pages to reformulate each of the two
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212 stories in order to demonstrate that they converge. Right.
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213
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214 Or, you know, it's, I haven't, it feels to me like that's not perhaps
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215 what you would like to do, but it's the only structure that I've been
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216 able to think of given what we've been saying so far. But, but maybe
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217 there's another I mean, yeah. Because there, the problem is that there
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218 are critical steps in each of those, which, which you understand, and
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219 which you may or may not have articulated in one place or another, is,
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220 you know, right.
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221
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222 Well, already, but they haven't been pulled together in a way.
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223
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224 BCS (15:32 - 15:41)
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225
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226 No, I think that's absolutely right. And I think my tendency would be
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227 to recapitulate both of them in one to 2000 pages.
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228
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229 HST (15:42 - 15:47)
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230
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231 Yes, well, that would serve nobody's interest.
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232
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233 BCS (15:48 - 17:54)
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234
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235 And one thing also that's interesting about the deixis story is that
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236 it is obvious to a very small number of people, all of whom I believe
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237 are computer scientists. And that's just an interesting
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238 intellectual history sort of fact. And very smart people, like my
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239 friend [whose name escapes me right now, young Rosa Tao ?@], father's a
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240 philosopher of science.
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241
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242 She's got two PhDs, one in philosophy, one in neuroscience now. And
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243 she's on the faculty at Stanford. And, and I like her too much.
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244
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245 She and I have had this explicit conversation about why it's obvious
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246 that the structure of indexicals in language, and the structure of
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247 magnetism, and the way physics is expressed in terms of properties,
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248 not objects, and that the regularities are differential, which is why
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249 the differential equations are used, are the same fact. And it just
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250 strikes her as inane and absolutely not.
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251
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252 They have nothing to do with each other.
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253
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254 HST (17:56 - 17:59)
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255
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256 It's certainly not inane, but it's not immediately effable @sp? to me either.
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257
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258 BCS (18:00 - 18:20)
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259
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260 Well, not only is it not immediately effable, but I feel as if I tried
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261 to express it in the objects book, I've tried to express it in
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262 numerous places since, and none of my expressions of it have actually
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263 made any headway with the people to whom it's not obvious, which is
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264 interesting.
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265
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266 HST (18:20 - 18:34)
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267
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268 Can you name anybody who has successfully, maybe already before you
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269 even mentioned it, grasped this?
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270
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271 BCS (18:35 - 18:47)
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272
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273 Well, Jun is one, but as I said to Jill, Jun probably understands my
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274 work as it were better than anybody, but nobody can understand him.
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275
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276 [cut all this@?]
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277 BCS (18:58 - 19:09)
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278
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279 So it's a puzzle to me, to what extent he should be named as, you
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280 know...
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281
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282 HST (19:09 - 19:14)
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283
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284 Whether he'll appear for the defense in court.
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285
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286 BCS (19:15 - 19:21)
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287
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288 Right. He failed his PhD oral at Duke in philosophy.
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289
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290 HST (19:22 - 19:25)
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291
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292 Yeah, I'm sure that could be said of many good people.
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293
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294 BCS (19:28 - 19:34)
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295
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296 Anyway, yeah, whether he should be custodian of the oeuvre, at any
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297 rate.
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298
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299 HST (19:36 - 19:51)
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300
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301 That has got to be a goal, it seems to me, to try to break through
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302 that logjam, but maybe, maybe too hard for this life. You were just
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303 going to revert to Fernando.
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304
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305 BCS (19:52 - 20:16)
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306
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307 Yes, I think he, I don't know if I just made this up, but I think he's
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308 somebody who thought, oh yeah, of course, that's obvious. And
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309 actually, someone who definitely thinks it's obvious [is Pengy guy]
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