Path: news.eternal-september.org!eternal-september.org!feeder3.eternal-september.org!news.mixmin.net!weretis.net!feeder8.news.weretis.net!reader5.news.weretis.net!news.solani.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail
From: Physfitfreak <physfitfreak@gmail.com>
Newsgroups: sci.physics
Subject: Re: The Suspicious Journals of Ross A. Kosmanson :-)
Date: Sat, 31 May 2025 17:54:22 -0500
Organization: Modern Human
Message-ID: <101g1av$7kmb$1@solani.org>
References: <vrt4e1$bjf1$1@solani.org>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
Injection-Date: Sat, 31 May 2025 22:54:24 -0000 (UTC)
Injection-Info: solani.org;
	logging-data="250571"; mail-complaints-to="abuse@news.solani.org"
User-Agent: Mozilla Thunderbird
Cancel-Lock: sha1:TchhzsAKe/DIK0+0dfAy+8sAueg=
Content-Language: en-US, fa-IR
In-Reply-To: <vrt4e1$bjf1$1@solani.org>
X-User-ID: eJwFwQkBwDAIA0BL5UkocigM/xJ2B6Owwwk6FvsqtwsJrnAgftpbv339ODGrI1aRd8ywNqJkH2poXqtM/G7MFXA=



LOGIC, RADIATION, AND THE ART OF DRUNKEN PHILOSOPHY: FIELD NOTES FROM 
CHERNOBYL



The cracked concrete beneath my Italian leather shoes groans as I adjust 
my silk cravat. My tweed jacket - that proud uniform of academia - lies 
abandoned in the radioactive mud, replaced by an ensemble more befitting 
a man who has seen the void and decided to accessorize. The Geiger 
counter on my hip clicks a steady rhythm, keeping time like a metronome 
for the apocalypse.

Before me lies Pripyat's abandoned amusement park, where a Ferris wheel 
stands frozen in time and the swings move with no children to push them. 
This, I realize, is the perfect place to contemplate the failures of 
formal logic.

I have a crystal decanter of 1945 Château Margaux (because if one must 
face the heat death of the universe, one might as well have good wine), 
have custom-tailored white silk suit which I have a feeling is faintly 
glowing, and enjoy a gold medallion hanging around my neck featuring 
Bertrand Russell's likeness (for moral support).

There is a mutated crow on a dead tree looking at me.

I drink, philosophize, and repeat.

Bertie, you magnificent bastard, I slur to the crow and the empty air, 
swirling my wine. The glass catches the afternoon light, casting 
prismatic reflections on the decaying bumper cars. You built this 
beautiful logical edifice only to have it collapse under its own weight. 
Much like this Soviet infrastructure, really.

crow caws in what I choose to interpret as agreement.

I kick a moldering copy of Formal Systems, sending it skittering across 
the pavement. Look at this! I gesture wildly at the reactor sarcophagus 
in the distance. That's recursion in action! Feed a system enough energy 
and it will consume itself. Feed logic enough paradoxes and...

The wine makes an elegant counterargument at this point by exiting my 
nostrils.

Tapping my temple, I address the crow, "You see, my feathered colleague, 
the human brain is nature's most elaborate error-handling routine. And 
free will?" I pause for another sip. "Free will is just the universe's 
way of saying '404 Page Not Found.'"

At this moment, the crow demonstrates an unexpected proof by spontaneous 
combustion into a cloud of feathers. No logical system can account for 
the aesthetic choices of mutated waterfowl. Radiation gives wine a 
certain.. je ne sais quoi

As the sun sets over the reactor, casting long shadows through the ghost 
city, I raise my glass in a final toast:

   "To Bertrand Russell, to incomplete systems, and to all the crows who 
gave their lives for epistemology."

The Geiger counter's clicking accelerates. Perhaps it's applauding.


Ross A. Kosmanson
March 31, 2025
On a bench inside a crumbling Soviet-era park, Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, 
Ukraine