1. - Explore what a SoCT-aligned group of capsuleers could do.1. There are already SoCT aligned capsuleers. Are you proposing working towards bigger goals, beyond simply corp objectives? Are you suggesting more rogue elements working towards goals beyond the scope of SoCT's normal operations? Are you suggesting full rogue elements? Or are you suggesting working towards the goals that SoCT are operating towards (as best as can be gleaned from the sparse information currently available)?
2. - Figure out how such groups would interact with other RP groups and existing factions.
3. - General discussion of the SoCT as a faction and what sneaky gits they are.
1. There are already SoCT aligned capsuleers.I'm sure there are SoCT-aligned capsuleers. Those are the people I hope to engage, both to exchange ideas and to see if I can avoid stepping on toes and fanon, and to find people to collaborate with.
Are you proposing working towards bigger goals, beyond simply corp objectives?Right now, I'd be happy just to have some corp objectives. Basically, I want to start a corp based on RP, but I also believe the corp needs to be able to have fun and get stuff done within the game. The SoCT can really justify doing anything in the game, but that's really like telling a starting EVE player they can do whatever they like to do - I want to start a SoCT RP group, and I want to have corp objectives that are interesting within the scope of that. It's difficult to recruit people without any sort of activity in mind, and it's difficult to decide on an activity without any people to confer with.
Are you suggesting more rogue elements working towards goals beyond the scope of SoCT's normal operations?Possibly, if people would be interested in such a thing. I wouldn't rule out the possibility of a slow alignment shift within the group. Perhaps there is a growing feeling that the project is being ignored by the Society, or CCP releases something which invalidates the project's official connection to the SoCT - in which case it might be possible to go technically rogue, but still be loyal to the Society's ultimate goal.
Are you suggesting full rogue elements?If that's what people are interested in, or if that's where the project drifts, I'm not at all opposed to it. If it seems the project would fit better as a rogue mirror image of the Society under the patronage of a pirate faction, I'm sure that could be fun.
Or are you suggesting working towards the goals that SoCT are operating towards (as best as can be gleaned from the sparse information currently available)?That would be my personal starting point, yes.
An amoral organization that churns out pilots who have no difficulty attaining positions of power, you say? :DI think Douglas Adams already covered it. :oops:
edit: I actually wonder what that Absolute Truth they're chasing might be. Anyone have ideas?
edit: I actually wonder what that Absolute Truth they're chasing might be. Anyone have ideas?Well, the Society was founded to find the meaning of life. Along the way they may have expanded the search to include the universe and everything. Gorda Hoje, the philosophical ancestor of the Society spoke of a concept he called Absolute Truth, and the search for it, and posited that "when the search ends, we end" - celebrating the search in itself but warning against finding the answer. His student Ior Labron then apparently founded the SoCT to pursue the answer, but considering the number of deliberate detours they have taken along that path, it's possible they have take Hoje's lesson to heart and are avoiding the actual answer.
Your ideas intrigue me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.No newsletters at present, but there is an in-game channel: "Int-Per-Mem"
In that conscious thought is the natural and final evolution of our species, or at least the evolutionary goal we're striving toward?An amoral organization that churns out pilots who have no difficulty attaining positions of power, you say? :DI think Douglas Adams already covered it. :oops:
edit: I actually wonder what that Absolute Truth they're chasing might be. Anyone have ideas?
However, if you take Anthropic Principle to it's logical conclusion, I think the Society of Conscious Thought is an apt description.
Based on Gödel's work, I don't think you can actually get to that state.One solution I've offered - mainly if the project ends up some sort of academy or such - is to have an administrative/evaluation board that may include people not in the corp proper. Thus super sekrit SoCT agents embedded in other groups don't have to abandon their operations to contribute.
Damn, this idea here is becoming more relevant to my interests. Maybe something that's not exactly a corp?
Based on Gödel's work, I don't think you can actually get to that state.Yes, no, kind of. I've a little experience with formal logic. Gödel's main work was proving a few shortcomings of formal logic, most notably that any consistent logical system whose expressiveness is worth a damn cannot be both complete and consistent, and moreover that any logical system can express its own consistency only if it's inconsistent itself.
Based on Gödel's work, I don't think you can actually get to that state.
Somebody stop me before I alt again...Stop! In the name of EVE, be-fore you aaaalt again!
Based on Gödel's work, I don't think you can actually get to that state.Yes, no, kind of. I've a little experience with formal logic. Gödel's main work was proving a few shortcomings of formal logic, most notably that any consistent logical system whose expressiveness is worth a damn cannot be both complete and consistent, and moreover that any logical system can express its own consistency only if it's inconsistent itself.
This sucks immensely if you're trying to build an axiomatized and self-proving theory of mathematics, the major project of logicians at the time. I'm not read well enough in epistemology to be definite about it, but the exact consequences of this result in that field aren't immediately clear to me.. human reason doesn't bluescreen when we come across a sentence like "this sentence is a lie"; we simply shrug, classify it as a paradox, and move on. I don't know what the exact relation between something being knowable and something being logically provable is; but I very much doubt anyone's come up with a definite answer.
Pure epistemology is just as treacherous. There's rather a lot of discussion on whether it's possible for things to be by their nature unknowable. The case for is that there's a good number of problems out there that we can't even begin to attack; the case against is that there's a fair few we thought to be intractable and have since solved. As you'd expect, the unknowable is a horrible beast to try and reason about.
I'm just trying to decide whether to integrate my new main into this somehow or roll another character.
Somebody stop me before I alt again...
Mhmm. Fair point... though I freely admit that you almost certainly do a better job than I can at this whole idea of integrating new choices and ideas into a singular character. In fact, most RPers probably do a better job at that than I do. :)There's nothing difficult about it. Compare yourself today, to yourself five years ago. You'll find it pretty different. It's the natural evolution of people. People change views, opinions, beliefs, a few times at least in their lifetime.
Something that struck me midway through writing this was that, if one of the implications of Gödel's incompleteness theorems is that (pure) mathematics is inexhaustible, then so too must physics as a finite superset of the laws of mathematics, i.e. there would always be new problems that couldn't be solved within existing rules. How this would tie in with the SoCT, I'm uncertain, due in no small part to my general fuzziness with this field -- would the existence of new problems as a result of the incompleteness theorems keep them going? Would they reach Istvaan's outcome as a result of being aware of the two theorems alongside everything else they know? Something else entirely?I suspect (but am once again not sure) that a physical ToE might be expressed as a subset within a larger logical system; un-isolable from it because it'd be unintelligible without reference to the system's constructs that necessarily lead to paradox or incompleteness, but not self-referencing in a way that leads to problems either, and a complete description of the physical laws of the universe.
Excellent point, and well-received. So then the question (to drag this back to something like the topic): the SoCT seems to focus on individuals they educated and indoctrinated. Does it have room for individuals coming to it later in life? >.>Edit: back on topic - yes, I'd say so. It might be exceptional to some degree, but old dogs can and do learn new tricks, and capsuleers are somewhat exceptional people to begin with. I don't think they're like the Millenarians, and only accept babies whose umbilical cord hasn't fallen off yet.
Excellent point, and well-received. So then the question (to drag this back to something like the topic): the SoCT seems to focus on individuals they educated and indoctrinated. Does it have room for individuals coming to it later in life? >.>If we go with my idea of a Kitzless academy type of thing, it would be easy to accept any comers. Even if we take it in another direction, I doubt it would be difficult to accommodate an oldbie.
Kurt Gödel (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_G%C3%B6del)Can't wrap my head around what this guy is trying to say. Not yet anyway.
Kurt Gödel (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_G%C3%B6del)Can't wrap my head around what this guy is trying to say. Not yet anyway.
Uhh... actually, a summary would be good.
Riiiiiiiiiiight!Kurt Gödel (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_G%C3%B6del)Can't wrap my head around what this guy is trying to say. Not yet anyway.
Uhh... actually, a summary would be good.
To greatly oversimplify to the point that Jev may stab me: in any fairly decent system, you can construct the equivalent of "this statement is false", which means that complete systems are inconsistent and consistent systems are incomplete.
Riiiiiiiiiiight!
*pretends to understand*
Now, can you put it in layman's terms for me? (and by "me" I mean anyone who hasn't taken philo classes?)
Seriously, if Horatius run something for these discussions IC, that would be a good start to his idea.We might have to come up with some kind of mangling convention for RL philosophers/arguments' names, or we'll pribably go stone cold crazy with coordinating and trying to remember made-up ones. /o\
I'll lay it out this way: Iurnan doesn't undock much. When he does, it's primarily just for travel, or rarely for moving items (hauling). Most of my gameplay consists of trading and talking to people (IC or OOC), where the RP motivation centers around gaining power and, in his mind, working in the shadowed entrances to the halls of power. (Note the difference between this statement and claiming he has power among the capsuleer class.)He would be most welcome to align himself with the project. You can't have too many Machiavellian financiers!
He's not much of a philosopher, though occasionally he'd like to be. He certainly does not have extensive technological expertise (again in comparison with some other capsuleers). What he does have is drive, ambition, and the desire to become the financier lurking behind the actual figurehead leader. He's very much in the vein of Niccolo Machiavelli, Chanakya (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chanakya), and Ibn Khaldun (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibn_Khaldun).
So when I see discussions about RP concepts that lend themselves to that sort of character, whether SoCT or GHSC ( :P ) or something else entirely, my ears perk up. I have certain ROE restrictions due to my corporation, but that only adds to the intrigue and machinations.
Actually, any given entity can only tolerate one Macchiavelian financier. Once there's two, there's trouble :)I'll lay it out this way: Iurnan doesn't undock much. When he does, it's primarily just for travel, or rarely for moving items (hauling). Most of my gameplay consists of trading and talking to people (IC or OOC), where the RP motivation centers around gaining power and, in his mind, working in the shadowed entrances to the halls of power. (Note the difference between this statement and claiming he has power among the capsuleer class.)He would be most welcome to align himself with the project. You can't have too many Machiavellian financiers!
He's not much of a philosopher, though occasionally he'd like to be. He certainly does not have extensive technological expertise (again in comparison with some other capsuleers). What he does have is drive, ambition, and the desire to become the financier lurking behind the actual figurehead leader. He's very much in the vein of Niccolo Machiavelli, Chanakya (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chanakya), and Ibn Khaldun (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibn_Khaldun).
So when I see discussions about RP concepts that lend themselves to that sort of character, whether SoCT or GHSC ( :P ) or something else entirely, my ears perk up. I have certain ROE restrictions due to my corporation, but that only adds to the intrigue and machinations.
And you can't have too much trouble :DActually, any given entity can only tolerate one Macchiavelian financier. Once there's two, there's trouble :)I'll lay it out this way: Iurnan doesn't undock much. When he does, it's primarily just for travel, or rarely for moving items (hauling). Most of my gameplay consists of trading and talking to people (IC or OOC), where the RP motivation centers around gaining power and, in his mind, working in the shadowed entrances to the halls of power. (Note the difference between this statement and claiming he has power among the capsuleer class.)He would be most welcome to align himself with the project. You can't have too many Machiavellian financiers!
He's not much of a philosopher, though occasionally he'd like to be. He certainly does not have extensive technological expertise (again in comparison with some other capsuleers). What he does have is drive, ambition, and the desire to become the financier lurking behind the actual figurehead leader. He's very much in the vein of Niccolo Machiavelli, Chanakya (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chanakya), and Ibn Khaldun (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibn_Khaldun).
So when I see discussions about RP concepts that lend themselves to that sort of character, whether SoCT or GHSC ( :P ) or something else entirely, my ears perk up. I have certain ROE restrictions due to my corporation, but that only adds to the intrigue and machinations.
Nah, the secretive investors are really meta-machiavellied, as it's all a big experiment to see how hard the SoCT can troll a couple of wealthy capsuleers while running away with their dosh.Wealthy capsuleers quit Eve, mostly. Once you have everything, what else is there to have?
Point 2 can be done, at least as far as shuffling blueprints for invention goes, or harvesting W-space for goodies, but I really get the feeling that most of the stuff the SoCT develops is far far beyond anything we as players can grasp at. Amnesia tonics? Brain-scrambling euphoria devices? Not sure you get those by smashing datacores together in a POS lab. That's not saying it's pointless to do science and industry with a SoCT-aligned corp, but it might not be the single most relevant thing to put effort into.http://www.eveonline.com/background/potw/default.asp?cid=01-06-09
The truth contains lies. Including the cake.Especially (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/EspeciallyZoidberg) the cake.
Knowledge about Sleepers and entry into Jamyl's boudoir, apparently.Old-chron-pic-Jamyl, not modern-day-hairbun-lady-Jamyl :|
...which means that complete systems are inconsistent and consistent systems are incomplete.
It's an interesting train of thought, actually.
Imagine humanity in present day. What do we strive toward? To make our lives easier.
We create the science of medicine to combat the diseases that plague us. We create the science of war to fight our enemies, and defeat them. We strive for the highest possible quality of life, and thus, our life spans are extended.
Well, what if all those goals were met? What if we didn't have to fear disease anymore, due to our medicinal advancement? What if the last war was fought, and we decided as a total human race never to fight one again?
What if every problem of our modern world, was solved?
Would we find new problems to worry about? I think we would. I think that, as our knowledge of the universe grew... the things we DIDN'T know... would bother us more and more.
There's a theme here. If there's a problem, we want to know how to solve it. We always want to better ourselves, to improve our standard of living.
But what happens when every human desire we have is provided for? What happens when every question we've ever asked, is answered?
Will there be more questions to ask? What happens if we run out of questions? Things to wonder? Things to explore and understand?
Now, imagine a post-singularity humanity. One whose ability to answer questions becomes so advanced, that they're answered right after asking?
Imagine an universe with nothing left to discover. No more search, no more hunt, merely all the answers you ever needed.
Imagine knowing everything.
Imagine knowing everything as a species whose sole evolutionary goal was: "Know more."
Wouldn't you get depressed too?
"Know more... no more."
Your ideas intrigue me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.No newsletters at present, but there is an in-game channel: "Int-Per-Mem"