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Article 1207 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: zeleny@zariski.harvard.edu (Mikhail Zeleny)
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.tech,comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: Is there any such thing as informal logic?
Message-ID: <1991Nov5.233331.5142@husc3.harvard.edu>
Date: 6 Nov 91 04:33:29 GMT
References: <JMC.91Nov2175822@SAIL.Stanford.EDU> <1991Nov3.031516.5007@husc3.harvard.edu> <1991Nov5.190928.6830@milton.u.washington.edu>
Organization: Dept. of Math, Harvard Univ.
Lines: 31
Nntp-Posting-Host: zariski.harvard.edu

In article <1991Nov5.190928.6830@milton.u.washington.edu> 
petry@milton.u.washington.edu (David Petry) writes:

>Some of us (less intelligent people) believe that "truth" consists of those
>beliefs which tend to increase the survival potential of humanity.  Thus 
>those beliefs which have absolutely no utility also have absolutely no truth.

Conversely, anything useful must ipso facto be true; if it is useful to the
Republican leadership to claim that trickle-down economics works, then it
must work.

>Or am I wrong? :-(

I wouldn't put it this way.

>David Petry
>
>Formalism = Dogmatism

Pragmatism = Opportunism


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| ``If there are no Platonic ideals, then what did we fight for?''   |
|                                (A Spanish anarchist, after 1938)   |
| Mikhail Zeleny                                           Harvard   |
| 872 Massachusetts Ave., Apt. 707                         doesn't   |
| Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139                            think    |
| (617) 661-8151                                              so     |
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