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Revision as of 21:00, 29 June 2004

See Talk:Time Cube/Delete for a past discussion on whether this article should have been deleted.

All the anti-Cubic arguments in the "Time Cube" article are actually wrong and can be easily refuted. However, rather than correct the article myself, I will simply invite any free thinkers who are interested in learning the Truth to debate Time Cube on the Time Cube forum. No closed-minded Academian pedants, please.

UPDATE: The forum is out of commission. However I may discuss Time Cube on user talk pages, like I did with Andrewa.

Archived debate: Andrewa vs. TIME CUBE

Section removed

This entire section was removed by an anonymous user, with the explanation "The time cube theory uses the cube as an analogy to help describe ideas. Stretching the analogy is not a good way to refute the theory." I'm no Time Cube expert, but it seems to me that Gene stretches the analogy himself, which would make this a perfectly valid subject of criticism. Comments, anyone? Bryan 19:05, 30 May 2004 (UTC)

I think the time cube is nonsense, but "stretching an analogy too far" means drawing false conclusions by assuming that the analog perfectly describes something else. If Gene Ray is using the analog to draw new conclusions, it's possible that this happened. It's also possible that he made conclusions without reasoning about an actual cube. Neither you nor I know which of these happened.

It's probable that he feels there are no remotely adequate words to describe the concept he has (I think that this is the reason he calls words evil). If this is the case, he might use an analogy to try to get his general idea across. If "cubelike" is a fairly adequate word, you would be justified in saying that he stretches the word (not the analogy) a bit too much. However, if he feels there are no words that are even close (including "cube"), he would be justified in picking the word that makes the best analog and stretching the word to make it fit what he's trying to say. Giving new definitions to old words when mainstream science makes a discovery is an accepted practice.

Now, on to the removed section itself. The criticism of "quadrant" because it uses a nonstandard definition was deleted first. There is no suitable replacement and Gene Ray gives a clear definition of it, so it should cause no confusion. The use of the term, by itself, certainly doesn't cause any logical errors.

The criticism of "cube" was because Gene Ray focuses on the four sides of the cube and ignores the top and bottom. This is perfectly reasonable if the concept deals only with a four-sided, cubelike object. The top and bottom would be irrelevant to the theory, regardless of the fact that the top and bottom are symmetrical with each of the sides. Ignoring irrelevant attributes of an analog is preferred because it focuses on the things that are actually similar and important to understanding and it ignores things that are dissimilar or unimportant. Bringing them up is foolish and a red herring.

Bringing up the fact that four is a square number, rather than a cube number, is also a red herring. If the thing under discussion is better understood by analogy to a three-dimensional shape (like a cube with the top and bottom missing), then using a square to represent it is stupid. A cube with two sides missing is much closer to a cube than a square and no amount of saying "but four is a square number" will change that.

12.214.45.9 23:40, 30 May 2004 (UTC)

Okay, this is quite sufficiently detailed to convince me the removal was well thought out. Thanks for answering; I tend to err on the side of caution when someone I don't recognize deletes a large block of text that I don't fully understand and I hope I didn't come across as assuming bad intentions. :) Bryan 00:26, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

Four cornered?

Has this idiot not noticed that cubes are not 4-cornered, but rather have 8 vertices? Also 6 faces, and 3 faces meeting at each vertex. There's almost nothing fourish about a cube! --Jerzy(t) 19:57, 2004 Jun 20 (UTC)

Criticism of this was the subject of the section whose removal I questioned above. Perhaps some version of it should be restored after all. Bryan 21:09, 20 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I think there should be, obviously, as I wrote the deleted section about this problem. Feel free to put it back, or preferably to improve upon it, I don't think it's the last word by any means. I caution against any careless use of technical terms in criticising the Time Cube, Ray does this all the time in promoting it and if others do too this will just make the confusion worse. Andrewa 07:12, 29 Jun 2004 (UTC)

You might also note what I said in the February VfD debate earlier this year: Significant crackpot theory based on the false premise that the cube is closely related to the number four. Perhaps that could be also better put, but I think that, contrary to what the anon above says, the mathematical weaknesses in the Time Cube symbolism are blatant enough to be significant. If so, this is relevant to understanding exactly what Ray is doing, which is the very last thing Ray himself wants. In hindsight I've gone back to my original thinking in the January VfD debate, this article should be a redirect to Gene Ray, which doesn't need another VfD debate. There is no evidence that anyone else promotes this theory, let alone significant numbers of people, and if so current policy would be that it doesn't get an article of its own. Ray himself deserves an article, he's significant if only for his critics. It's also interesting IMO that this latest debate is by an anon who claims to reject the "theory", but whose edits to this talk page and the article seem to reduce the content of both pages and enhance Ray's credibility. There have been many edits from this IP, but are they all the same person? Probably not another Ray glove puppet is my guess, but we have no way of knowing. All we know is that Ray does seem to have lots of time to set up Internet accounts etc.. Andrewa 21:00, 29 Jun 2004 (UTC)

After reading it for the second time, I suddenly found Gene Ray's website to be the funniest thing I'd ever seen. Something in my mind clicked over from scepticism to overwhelming amusement at its bizarreness. Hence I am now compromised to the point where the only words of criticism I can muster are Evil Ass Educators Suppress Time Cube, and dumb ass students condone such evil. Cubeless institutions are spreaders of evil, and students lack mentality to challenge it. And ain't it the truth. -- Tim Starling 07:50, Jun 29, 2004 (UTC)