Re: your example, no. (600,1000) is a continuum, which means the conditions at 740 will be *a lot* like those at 640, 840, etc. [†] "Edge" isn't really jargon. As to how one knows where the edges are, there's only one answer, and that is to go over it. Until you *fall* off the edge, you won't really know that you've reached it ... same way you find the edge of a table, by panning your eyes from the surface to beyond the surface. Similarly, if you *don't* find the edge, you'll never really know how *big* the domain is ... or what that other domain on the other side of the edge is like.
In the case of the experiences we're talking about, here, nootropics -- basically performance enhancing drugs -- are distinguishable from psychedelics. Large doses of psychedelics are at or beyond most people's "edge", whereas a nootropic simply makes you feel a little more competent. So, micro-dosing would *not* be exploring the edge cases. But the kind of experiences Dave's talking about are. [†] Of course, there are all sorts of different kinds of spaces. Continuum is just one kind. And, of course, there's dimensionality, where 1 dimension might have an edge, but another doesn't (e.g. walking near a cliff, with an edge in the up-down but no edge in the side-to-side). And, of course, there's got to be some "invariant" that provides the *operative* (operational) definition of the domain. In your example, speed isn't actually the important factor. It might be something like vibration, harmonics, turbulence, or whatever that makes the plane unstable at some particular speed. In my example, it's not speed but acceleration that defines the domain. But you don't really need all this sophistry to understand what "edge" means. On 2/23/20 4:37 PM, thompnicks...@gmail.com wrote:
What, a priori, constitutes an "edge". How do we know where "edges" are? To take an absurd example, imagine that we had a way of flying an airplane above 1,000 mph and below 600 mph without ever passing through 740 mph. So, somebody says, "We've never tried 740; let's try that!" Would that be an edge? So, "edginess" is defined only by paucity of data? Or is there something else to it?
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