Dammit, I'm mad

[ciroccoj]

... at myself for not doing the home schooling thing earlier.

Spent about half the day at the Children's Museum again, with a long traipse through the rest of the building (Museum of Civilisation, in part because Daniel is learning about Native Canadians and there's a huge exhibit of West Coast Native stuff downstairs). Also went to a very short meeting with my assistant editors in the morning and managed to finish all my Labour Law readings and most of my Law Review readings while the kids played in the World Market and the Pyramids section in the Children's Museum. A pretty relaxed, fun, and productive day.

Of course I'm also pretty wiped, but it's a good kind of wiped. A "wow I did a lot of stuff - gonna sleep like a log tonight" rather than "I don't know if I can manage to slog through until I'm allowed to collapse in a heap and lay awake wondering if I can possibly survive another day like today and trying to decide whether the fact that I've survived about three years' worth of days just like today is comforting or horrifying."

Had too many of those when the kids were babies and Chris was starting his residency and we were both deeply depressed. This? Is better.

***
Speaking of Law Review readings: "If a judge has any appeals court experience, he or she can be considered for a position on the Supreme Court. This means, of course, that if a judge does not have any appeals court experience, he or she cannot be considered."

Make sense?

I remember, waaay back in second year (undergrad) Formal Methods or possibly Discreet Math (as opposed to Casual Methods and Blatant Math), we were told that (I know I'm screwing up the technical symbols here, but I can't find the right ones in HTML):

(N -> P) does not equal (not!N -> not!P).

In other words, if the fact that N is true necessarily implies that P is true, this does not mean that if N is false, P must therefore also be false.

Otherwise the statement "If a child's name is Bill, he or she is a boy. This means, of course, that if a child's name is not Bill, he or she is not a boy" would make perfect sense.

I just went through a sixty page paper where there were at least ten of the above assertions, and long, very persuasive arguments based on those assertions. My head is spinning. I no longer feel entirely confident in my knowledge of my own name.

Comments

[daf9.livejournal.com]

if N implies P then not N does not imply not P but not P implies not N. so if a child's name is Bill implies he or she is a boy, then if he or she is NOT a boy, his or her name can't be Bill. I think that's how it goes.

[ciroccoj.livejournal.com]

Hm... that looks familiar. And I have the sneaking suspicion it's right. OTOH, following that logic,

If "X = my mother's sister" -> "X = my aunt", then "X = not mother's sister" -> "X = not my aunt".

God, it's been a long, long time since I did this stuff. Sure wish I remembered more of it.

[daf9.livejournal.com]

if X = my mother's sister implies X is my aunt then if X is not my aunt implies X is not my mother's sister. The way you've written it would be incorrect because X could be your father's sister or the wife of your mother's or father's brother and still be your aunt.

[ciroccoj.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that's what I meant. X could be not my mother's sister, but still my aunt.

[ciroccoj.livejournal.com]

And, inputting that into the original statement in the article,

"If a judge has any appeals court experience, he or she can be considered for a position on the Supreme Court. This means, of course, that if a judge cannot be considered for the Supreme Court, he or she does not have any appeals court experience."

Which is not true; perhaps they've been on the appeals court judge for 40 years, and another rule for picking Supremes is that they can't have more than 30 years on the bench.

Arg, I don't know if any of this makes sense.

[daf9.livejournal.com]

Maybe it makes more sense if you reverse N and P? If a judge can be considered for a position on the Supreme Court then the judge has some appeals court experience implies that if a judge doesn't have some appeals court experience implies that the judge can't be considered for a position on the Supreme Court.

[ciroccoj.livejournal.com]

I think that's what I said. But I may be wrong.

In any case, following that logic, it would be impossible for a judge to be considered for a position in the Supreme Court if they have no appeals court experience. Which is not true. A judge could have extensive experience as a trial judge in some court that, while fairly chi-chi, is not an appeals court. So the statement doesn't make sense. Just like "X = not my mother's sister means X is not my aunt" doesn't make sense, because, as you said, X could be my father's sister and still my aunt.

Anyway, the point is, N -> P does not mean not!N -> not!P.

And I think I better stop before I go cross-eyed @(

[daf9.livejournal.com]

Or how about this possibility

If being sexy implies
That Rey is not wise
Then if Rey is not stupid
Does that mean that Cupid
Must bid him regretful goodbyes?

[ciroccoj.livejournal.com]

::snortlaugh::

Thanks :D :D :D