Re: VMs: Re: NSU review of Rugg (2003)...

[Gabriel Landini <G.Landini@xxxxxxxxxx>]

On Thursday 18 December 2003 10:15, Gordon Rugg wrote:
> I think a closer analogy would be if someone denied that a computer could
> write poetry, and then someone produced a program which could write
> something that was generally agreed to constitute a poem.

Here we are arguing whether the vms can be produced by some unspecified 
method. I guess that it would not be too difficult to show that there may be 
more than one way to produce vms-like text to various degrees. But, the real 
problem is to decide whether any of those methods was in fact used.

How can one be so sure of this?
How can one rule out that it may be indeed some reversible or even a lossy 
encoded document? Is the lack of current methods to produce vms-like 
documents? I do not think so (absence of evidence is not evidence of 
absence).

I am also concerned that if the hoax possiblitiy is brought in, then the 
problem becomes a loop: the method is based on the solution, which cannot be 
verified because a hoax implies no-meaning.

This brings memories of the JL Borges story (in his book Fictions) about 
Pierre Menard as the author of El Quijote.

Cheers,

Gabriel



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