A Quick Puzzle to Test Your Problem Solving

Re:A Quick Puzzle to Test Your Problem Solving by GhotiFish on Thursday July 02, 2015 @09:32PM (#9822886)

Thanks for the link! That was an interesting read, but I don't think I understand the premise of the argument.

From the article

  ... It is perfectly consistent with your previous use of 
  'plus' that you actually meant it to mean the 'quus' 
  function, ...

That may be true, but only if you assume I'm not referring to the plus derived from the axioms of principa mathematica. I am. Is it then the question that when I refer to the principa mathematica that I'm actually referring to principa quus? If I then describe axiom 1 can you not know my words are referring to axiom quus?

It seems the only power of this assertion is that language provides no absolute common ground.

Am I understanding this correctly?

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Re:A Quick Puzzle to Test Your Problem Solving by Matumio on Friday July 03, 2015 @08:27AM (#9825089)

This makes my head hurt. Surely Wittgenstein had permission to use Occam's razor? I mean, if it's possible that you actually meant quus_5 then it's equally possible that you meant quus_3 or quus_114, but since you didn't mention that, I will just assume you meant whichever requires the least amount of parameter-guessing from my side. After all, you have written it down for a human receiver, not for an alien from the Quus_8th dimension.

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