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george says...
>> Okay, that's the background. Now here are the questions:
>>
>> Peter is asked: Will Daryl answer "yes"?
>
>Yes to what? When?
>
>> Daryl is asked: Will Peter answer "no"?
>
>Yes to what? When?
I thought I made it clear how the game works.
Each player is carried off to a room, and allowed
to think about his response. At some point, the
player comes out of the room and makes an utterance.
By the rules of the game, the legal utterances are
"yes" and "no".
Peter is being asked: Will Daryl's utterance
be "yes". Daryl is being asked: Will Peter's
utterance be "no".
There is really no ambiguity in the interpretation
of these questions.
>> I think it is clear that there is nothing paradoxical about
>> the questions.
>You're quite wrong.
No, there is nothing at all paradoxical going on. None of the
possible outcomes leads to any kind of contradiction.
> Someone
> asks Daryl to answer the following question with "yes" or "no"
> (and to make no other responses)
>
> Will the next answer you give be "no"?
>
> In this case, Daryl cannot correctly answer the question, but
> it is possible for him to *know* the answer (and keep it to
> himself)...
> He can refuse to answer at all, in which case, he
> can know that the correct answer is "no".
>No, it isn't.
Well, it depends on the precise phrasing. If the question
is phrased as "Will Daryl give the answer 'no'"?, then
the lack of any answer means in particular that Daryl did
not answer "no".
--
Daryl McCullough
Ithaca, NY
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