Brian Rabern

Reader in philosophy at the University of Edinburgh

[Brian Rabern @brian_rabern]

the article is for subscription only, but the paper it is discussing is here: https://t.co/kJJdr7M2Mn

[New Scientist @newscientist]

You can maximise your chances of winning the board game Guess Who? if you follow a strategy devised by a group of mathematicians, but it could involve some head-scratching logical conundrums. https://t.co/kWojX4kp9o

[Brian Rabern @brian_rabern]

Find me on bluesky: https://t.co/p3DuTkwSi9

[Brian Rabern @brian_rabern]

@JDHamkins @DruckerDaniel I think that similar uncertainly could be raised about the level pulling case. And in fact about almost any thought experiment. I suppose I’m more optimistic about our ability to hold fixed stipulations about a scenario and make judgments about what would follow

[Brian Rabern @brian_rabern]

@JDHamkins @DruckerDaniel I suppose I don’t understand what you mean by “believable”. I think all that matters is that the scenario in the thought experiment is possible. It doesn’t have to be something that is common or ordinary or whatever.

[Brian Rabern @brian_rabern]

@JDHamkins @DruckerDaniel Tell that to Einstein and his “unbelievable” ride on a light beam

[Brian Rabern @brian_rabern]

this brings me back (in two ways)

[Brian Rabern @brian_rabern]

chalmers recently asked me if I had a view on the semantics of email addresses. this caused me to form one. To get the thoughts out of my system I wrote a little note. this was just for fun -- but criticism or suggestions welcome
https://t.co/YwhIK3qBNh

#semantics #email

[Brian Rabern @brian_rabern]

The academic journal Ergo publishes simpler, shorter, and more digestible versions of the articles it publishes. The idea is to help the work reach a wider audience. Here is the post for my recent article: #quantifiers

https://t.co/H0ODoGEQBU

[Brian Rabern @brian_rabern]

@juskhoo I don’t know about “great” but I had a lot of fun making mine. It’s all made “from scratch” using JavaScript/React and styling with TailwindCSS. I did a bit of integration with philpapers so it automatically pulls my bibtex data. hosted free on github: https://t.co/WvPVM7meUV

[Brian Rabern @brian_rabern]

@TobyMeadows @NdeRancourt well, the view that the indicative “if A, B” is the material conditional has been defended by some prominent theorists (Philo of Megara, Grice, Jackson, and actually Lewis). I don’t think it’s the right view but it’s not obviously wrong. See https://t.co/iE2pjWd4tP

[Brian Rabern @brian_rabern]

@idkmaen009 If there were no universities, then there would there’d be a number of universities, namely 0.

[Brian Rabern @brian_rabern]

@HenryISchiller derek and I made a plea for more of it in 2018: https://t.co/WugiK7BEH8

[Brian Rabern @brian_rabern]

@kennethblackphi @juskhoo @PaoloSantorio Ah, yeah talking with conspiracy theorists is weird. I was just thinking normally I’d say “what’d ya mean ‘if the Nazis won”. You make a good point about the case where the presupposition is accommodated

[Brian Rabern @brian_rabern]

What is the current view on the following question: Does the counterfactual “P[]->Q” entail the corresponding indicative “if P, Q”? @juskhoo @PaoloSantorio et. al. ( pointers to any recent discussions helpful)

[Brian Rabern @brian_rabern]

@kjoshanssen ok, if you wanna talk that way then obviously it’s {a,a}. The set containing a and the thing identical to a. That is, this set {a}.

[Brian Rabern @brian_rabern]

@focusfronting It’s close to affirming the consequent so it makes sense to call it that. But strictly speaking it isn’t a fallacy of propositional logic—instead it’s syllogistic or quantificational logic. It’s called "converting a universal affirmative": “All As are Bs” to “All Bs are As”.