Image: Wikimedia Commons
You are shown four symbols
and told by the experimenter "I have picked one colour (black or
white) and one shape (square or circle). A symbol that possesses exactly
one of the properties I have picked, is called a THOG. The black circle
is a THOG. For each of the other symbols, are they a) definitely a
THOG, b) undecidable, or c) definitely not a THOG?" wikipedia (also cf. Futility Closet)
'Do you think I am saved?' he says. 'I am covered in lamp black and my hands smell of coin, and when I see myself in a glass I see grime – I suppose that is the beginning of wisdom? About my fallen state, I have no choice but agree. I must meddle with matters that corrupt – it is my office. In the golden age the earth yielded all we required, but now we must dig for it, quarry it, blast it, we must drive the world, we must gear and grind it, roll and hammer and pulp it. There must be dinners cooked, Rob. There must be slates chalked, and ink set to page, and money made and bargains struck, and we must give the poor the means to work and eat.' -- The Mirror and the Light, Hillary Mantel
It is generally very difficult to prove that something does not exist; it is considerably easier to show that a tool is inadequate for studying that something. With a small-telescopes approach, instead of arriving at the conclusion that a theoretically interesting effect does not seem to exist, we arrive at the conclusion that the original evidence suggesting a theoretically interesting effect exists does not seem to be adequate. -- Uri Simonsohn
