Could robust statistics be relevant for explaining fixed points where disagreements do not change at all?
Roughly speaking, the idea of robust statistics is that the median or similar concepts may be preferable in some circumstances to the mean—and unlike the mean, the median routinely does not change at all, even when another datapoint changes.
I don’t think that really helps. If you’re treating someones beliefs as an outlier, then you’re not respecting that person as a rationalist.
Even if you did take the median of your metaprobability distribution (which is not the odds you want to bet on, though you may want to profess them for some reason), eventually you should change your mind (most bothersome disagreements involve people confidently on opposite sides of the spectrum so the direction in which to update is obvious).
It could be that in practice most people update beliefs according to some more “robust” method, but to the extent that it freezes their beliefs under new real evidence, its a sucky way of doing it and you don’t get a ‘get out of jail free’ card for doing it.
Could robust statistics be relevant for explaining fixed points where disagreements do not change at all?
Roughly speaking, the idea of robust statistics is that the median or similar concepts may be preferable in some circumstances to the mean—and unlike the mean, the median routinely does not change at all, even when another datapoint changes.
I don’t think that really helps. If you’re treating someones beliefs as an outlier, then you’re not respecting that person as a rationalist.
Even if you did take the median of your metaprobability distribution (which is not the odds you want to bet on, though you may want to profess them for some reason), eventually you should change your mind (most bothersome disagreements involve people confidently on opposite sides of the spectrum so the direction in which to update is obvious).
It could be that in practice most people update beliefs according to some more “robust” method, but to the extent that it freezes their beliefs under new real evidence, its a sucky way of doing it and you don’t get a ‘get out of jail free’ card for doing it.