ConwayLife.com

Apropos number theory and money:

There are three sorts of numbers nowadays:

The natural numbers everybody knows who is able to count beyond 3, developed by mathematicians ever since Pythagoras founded the school of Elea in southern Italy by the time the city of Rome was nothing more than a little village north of the volcano Vesuvius, upto Peano axioms, number theory and Conways surreal numbers, as we know them today. Furthermore there are the complex numbers exploited by theoretical physicists when they try to describe and explain the world we live in.

Both of these are needed and useful to solve real world problems, tasks and challenges like e.g. detecting gravitational waves and Higgs bosons, building airplanes and oil tankers and, not to forget, "landing a man on the moon and returning him safely back to earth."

And then, finally, there are these intentionally crippled numbers called money, which are perfectly suited for all those who are too lazy to count beyond 3 and rather use sophisticated calculation machines to make use of the endless fun possibilities computers might offer. Unlimited on the one side, the main, the currency side of the $, the £, the €, the ¥, etc. pp, but strictly limited to 2 digits on the other side, the % side, of the decimal point. Numbers more deadly and addictive than heroin.

Cause when the cash begins to flow
Then they really don't care anymore
About all those gym gyms in this town
And everybody putting everybody else down
And all the polititians making crazy sounds
And all the dead bodies piled up in mounts

(with apologies to John F. Kennedy, Lou Reed and @Moosey)

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Completely off topic, I know, but here you are @ExtinctionRebellion's first newsletter in 2o2o:

https://rebellion.earth/2020/01/14/news ... igh-water/

Hubi1857 wrote: January 14th, 2020, 8:28 pmCompletely off topic, I know, but here you are @ExtinctionRebellion's first newsletter in 2o2o:

https://rebellion.earth/2020/01/14/news ... igh-water/

It wasn't just the last paragraph that was off topic, though. The entire post wandered off on a wild numerical tangent; it wasn't even slightly related to the Bounties topic where it was posted. So I've moved the post to the Sandbox. This kind of thing is maybe vaguely acceptable here, but on other boards, please try to post comments that continue the topic of the thread in some way.

Hubi1857 wrote: January 14th, 2020, 8:35 pmLOL! Just you wait and see what happens once I started contaminating the rest of this splendid forum...

As mniemiec has mentioned in response to the above, successful "contamination" isn't too common. We're generally fairly polite around here, and the forum rules reflect that. Please read them over, and try to use these forums as they're intended to be used.

My apologies on behalf of anyone who may have pushed the boundaries of politeness a bit; it seemed as if they might have been responding in kind to what looked like disrespect on your part (the "you simply don't know what you're talking about" post).

That thread has certainly created a fine example of a painful downward spiral, but please try to avoid creating or participating in any more of those. Moosey's point was perfectly valid, and to an outside observer it didn't seem to be phrased disrespectfully. Your two posts just before Moosey's comment still say things like

Hubi1857 wrote: January 10th, 2020, 3:50 amPhase three, identical to Phase one,
displaced one cell each towards South and East directions

A glider's phase 3 is not identical to phase 1 in the way that your illustrations show; it's identical in shape, but reflected across a diagonal line, and the displacement you give is not correct. All of the following downward spiral seems to have been caused by your lack of acknowledgment of this point.

You are doomed to die because you are imprisoned within the brains between your ears!

dvgrn wrote: January 14th, 2020, 9:54 pm A glider's phase 3 is not identical to phase 1 in the way that your illustrations show; it's identical in shape, but reflected across a diagonal line, and the displacement you give is not correct. All of the following downward spiral seems to have been caused by your lack of acknowledgment of this point.

To demonstrate, let me show Hubi that I have tried to communicate this multiple times, (more and more) to no effect, other then him asking me to leave the thread and then swearing at me when I temporarily complied.


Also

Hubi1857 wrote: January 14th, 2020, 10:11 pm You are doomed to die because you are imprisoned within the brains between your ears!

This is... weird, to say the least

dvgrn wrote: January 14th, 2020, 9:54 pm My apologies on behalf of anyone who may have pushed the boundaries of politeness a bit; it seemed as if they might have been responding in kind to what looked like disrespect on your part ...

I am inclined to back off, particularly if his comments are kept to Sandbox. I at first tried to explain a few points, such as the significance of p23 oscillator and now realize the futility of it.

Showing the wrong glider phase repeatedly and never correcting it leaves me wondering what part is intentional and what part is pure trolling. I am not in favor of banning anyone (and don't know the policies) but I will try to minimize any further response to avoid encouraging these threads.

(Note: I may even agree with him on some political views, but this is not a political forum or a venue for Dadaist screeds.)