Author: 胡翌霖

Preliminary Thoughts on “Intuitionism”

Philosophy & Thought2006.08.07
Preliminary Thoughts on “Intuitionism”
My term paper for my class on logical paradoxes has now been decided: I’m going to write on intuitionism and the foundations of mathematics. At first I had been dead set on writing about inductive logic, and I read a lot of books, but the more I read, the fewer ideas of my own I seemed to have left; in the end they were almost completely buried. Writing an article that simply surveys the various schools of thought isn’t very interesting either, and I also seem unable to sort out any ideas of my own in such a short time, so in the end I had no choice but to…
philosophy mathematics Kant Poincaré
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2006年8月7日
One of a Few Puzzlers: The Three-Person Peach Juice Problem

History of Science & Scholarship2006.08.05
One of a Few Puzzlers: The Three-Person Peach Juice Problem
During the summer vacation I was supposed to help Bobo prepare a book of logic and reasoning puzzles, so after coming back to Shanghai I went rummaging through the pile of Olympiad math books and recreational math books that I had kept at the bottom of my chest. I had always had the most of this kind of book, so finding several dozen problems was easy enough. Of course, for the sake of originality, I would rewrite both the problems and the solutions. The first thing that came to mind was the classic five pirates dividing the loot problem: five pirates divide 100 gems. The five men in turn propose…
book reading notes mathematics logic
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2006年8月5日
A Dialogue on the Fourth Floor of a Building Without a Fourth Floor

History of Science & Scholarship2006.08.01
A Dialogue on the Fourth Floor of a Building Without a Fourth Floor
Oh, God, why is two plus two equal to four? —Alexander Pope Luo Ji: I hear a new bookstore has opened on the 5th floor? Bei Lun: Yes. Luo: Then I must go have a look. Bei: Fine, we’re on the 2nd floor now. Go up three more escalators and we’ll be there…… Luo: Why? Bei: ……Why what? Luo: I’m asking why going up three more escalators gets us there? Bei: ……Because we’re on the 2nd floor now. Luo: I’m asking why going up three floors from the 2nd floor makes the 5th floor? Bei: This…… because…… because 2+3=5! Come on, let’s go, hurry up—I really regret indulging you just…
philosophy science mathematics paradox
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2006年8月1日
Reason and Ultimate Concern—An Attempt to Examine Why Mature Rational People Seek Religion

Philosophy & Thought2006.07.31
Reason and Ultimate Concern—An Attempt to Examine Why Mature Rational People Seek Religion
Introduction The relationship between reason and religious faith has always been a vexed issue in theology, philosophy of religion, and sociology of religion: are reason and faith mutually supportive, complementary, or incompatible? Is religious faith merely the choice of people who are ignorant or not intellectually mature enough? If so, why do so many people who at least appear to have sound psychology and mature intellect—such as even many of the most outstanding natural scientists of the contemporary era[①]—still piously believe in religion? The sociologist of religion Stark complained: “The idea that humans are essentially rational animals is the common foundation of mainstream modern social science. Religion is the only…
philosophy faith Aristotle religion
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2006年7月31日
The Paradox of Boring Games

Philosophy & Thought2006.07.30
The Paradox of Boring Games
Someone in the paradox studies course was planning to talk about some chess sophistry, saying that chess is a boring game, but his reasoning has serious problems. Let me reinforce it a bit: I’ll first offer a chess variant with slightly altered rules, and start with a math problem: **Two-move chess:** Modify the rules of chess so that in each round each player may make two consecutive moves, with everything else unchanged. Prove that the player to move first has a strategy of at least a draw. The proof is very simple: Proof by contradiction. Assume the first player has no strategy of at least a draw. That is, no…
philosophy mathematics game logic
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2006年7月30日
A New Beginning That Is Increasingly Disappointing

Life & Notes2006.07.29
A New Beginning That Is Increasingly Disappointing
Nowadays young people…… why are they all so practical, so mature? Lately I’ve begun interacting again with the incoming class of 2006 in the Philosophy Department. I have never lost my enthusiasm for wandering around the Weilai Beida Ren community; I like interacting with new students. One reason I like wandering around the Weilai Beida Ren community is this: my own entrance into Peking University, into the Philosophy Department, was really a matter of pure chance, and for that I especially need to thank one teacher in Peking University’s admissions office. I think the best way to express gratitude is precisely this: in a certain sense I too do work…
philosophy everyday life education Peking University
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2006年7月29日
A Casual Recollection of My Growing Up: An Interlude on Games

Life & Notes2006.07.29
A Casual Recollection of My Growing Up: An Interlude on Games
——————————————(continued from previous)—————————— Let me slow down a bit and write about high school first. What I wrote before was mostly about my academic life, but study and entertainment have always been inseparable. So here I’ll look back once more at the various forms of entertainment and games I’ve enjoyed since childhood: When I was very little there was nothing especially distinctive. I played the toys that ordinary little boys liked to play with, and most of them I barely remember now. What I do remember is that when I was a child I often liked to buy those pretty elastic balls made of rubber. At the time, along Fuyou…
autobiography self game anime
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2006年7月29日
A Casual Recollection of My Growing-Up Years: Donggezhi Middle School

Life & Notes2006.07.26
A Casual Recollection of My Growing-Up Years: Donggezhi Middle School
——————————————（continued from previous）—————————— Dong Gezhi Middle School had its predecessor in Puming Normal School. We were the second cohort of students admitted by Dong Gezhi. When we were in school, there were still a few cohorts of the original Puming Normal School students, and several of the teachers had even done their practicum at our place. Principal Fu of Dong Gezhi had been the vice principal of the original Gezhi Middle School; after leaving Gezhi he wanted to strike out on his own and build something of his own, and thus Dong Gezhi Middle School came into being. At that time we happened to catch the first round of abolishing…
China education autobiography mathematics
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2006年7月26日
To Get Thoroughly Soaked in the Rain

Life & Notes2006.07.24
To Get Thoroughly Soaked in the Rain
Although it has been drizzling and raining off and on lately, today’s thunderstorm this evening was downright exhilarating—a veritable downpour. I had originally been lying lazily in bed, getting by even meals with instant noodles or takeout, when, listening to the torrential rain pounding down, I suddenly had a whim: how many years has it been since I last got thoroughly drenched in a real rainstorm? …At least three or five years, I suppose. Time really does fly! I do occasionally go a little crazy, and many spur-of-the-moment ideas are acted on at once. I grabbed an outfit that was neither clean nor dirty, changed into a pair of shorts…
everyday life body
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2006年7月24日
A Few Random Recollections of My Growing Up: An Interlude on My Hometown

Life & Notes2006.07.22
A Few Random Recollections of My Growing Up: An Interlude on My Hometown
——————————————（continued from the previous post）—————————— Speaking of what happened after I entered Jingdezhen No. 1 Middle School, I then left my old home and moved to live in Pudong. Before recalling my junior-high school years, I might as well review the various “homes” I have lived in (of course, mainly in order to write about that old home of mine, the one that left me with the deepest memories and has already passed forever out of this world). Since these recollections have nothing to do with my student life, they can stand alone as a separate piece: When I was born, we lived at 677 Renmin Road, in a place…
culture autobiography Chinese city
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2006年7月22日