what happens before the long run matters
Most times I feel that philosophy is only here to point out the obvious
recall the condition in Chapter 12 about not properly
transferring between past and future, an autism-like condition in
humans not seeing second order relations –the subject does not use the
relation between the past’s past and the past’s future to project the
connection between today’s past and today’s future. Well, a gentleman
called Alan Greenspan the former Chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve
Bank, went to congress to explain that the banking crisis, which he and
his successor Bernanke helped cause, could not have been foreseen
because it “never happened before” –not a single congressman was
intelligent enough to shout “Alan Greenspan, you never died before, for
eighty years; does it make you immortal?”
It is indeed the
absence of higher order representation –the inability to accept
statements like “is my method to assess what is right or wrong right or
wrong?” that, we will see in the next section, is central while dealing with
probability, that causes Dr. Johns to be suckers for measures and believe
in them without doubting their beliefs. They fail to understand the
metaprobability, the higher order probability, that is, the probability that
the probability they are using may not be True.
…
There is another difference here, between ‘true” randomness (say
the equivalent of God throwing a die) and randomness that results from
what I call epistemic limitations, that is, lack of knowledge. What is
called ontological (or ontic) uncertainty, as opposed to epistemic, is the
type of randomness where the future is not implied by the past (or not
even implied by anything). It is created every minute by the complexity of
our actions, which makes the uncertainty much more fundamental than
the epistemic one coming from imperfections in knowledge.
-The Black Swan
(;whole article in pdf)
- those who find his discriminating take offensive – its just one perspective
it’s the irony
We tend to think of hypochondria as a kind of selfishness. The hypochondriac remains a disreputable figure, solipsistic and even immune to the real suffering of others. But psychologists tell us that hypochondria is often also part of a group or family dynamic; the patient acts out the expectations of others who somehow need him or her to be sick. What better description could there be of our attitude—at once awed and repelled, envious and disproving—to the bodies of certain celebrities? What better image of our grisly concern when the heroic patient takes an Icarus fall? via
an unlikely family portrait
my family and my cousin’s baby Emily. fam pic will be up here til i can’t stand looking at it
now that it’s over you want it again.
high tea set @ harvey nicks. it was my last day @ HK as well.
a little something to save the day
Seen on TVB: fred butler-inspired set and a headpiece that saves the show.
the best smoke and the best mirrors (from 1950s again!)
the house across the street @ suburb LA. a pity i didnt take a picture of a nighttime view when all the xmas lights were on and evocative of the perfect house party, belonging to any perfect american film really.
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