I think there is another assumption (or another way of framing your assumption, I’m not sure if it is really distinct), which is that all people throughout time are alike. It’s not necessarily groundless, but it is an assumption. There could be some symmetry breaking factor that determines your position that doesn’t simply align with “total humans that ever exist”, and thus renders using the “birth rank” inappropriate to determine what number you have. This thing doesn’t have to be related to reproduction though.
It’s not a distinct assumption. It’s the same assumption, but formulated in a terribly confusing manner as a lot of things in anthropics are.
The “likeness” is relevant for SSA reference class which is somewhat of a free parameter in the theory. The correct reference class is the group of people from which you could’ve been anyone. And this question is very much related to reproduction in case of Doomsday argument. I’ll be talking about reference classes and how it’s technically possible to salvage SSA with them in a future post.
I think the factors that determine your reference class can be related to changes over time in the environment you inhabit, not just how you are built. This is what I mean by not necessarily related to reproduction. If I cloned a billion people with the same cloning vat over 1000 years, how then would you determine reference class? But maybe something about the environment would narrow that reference class despite all the people being made by the same process (like the presence or absence of other things in the environment as they relate to the people coming out of the vat).
I think the factors that determine your reference class can be related to changes over time in the environment you inhabit, not just how you are built.
In principle—yes. Different settings of probability experiments naturally lead to different reference classes. But in case of DA this seem to boil down to the question of reproduction.
If I cloned a billion people with the same cloning vat over 1000 years, how then would you determine reference class? But maybe something about the environment would narrow that reference class despite all the people being made by the same process (like the presence or absence of other things in the environment as they relate to the people coming out of the vat).
A person created by this vat may start from assuming that you are a random person from that billion and then adjust their credence based on available evidence as usual. Like if you checked the year of your creation, now you treat yourself as a random person from the people created in this vat specifically in this year. You can frame is as change of reference class or as simple bayesian update on the available evidence.
I think there is another assumption (or another way of framing your assumption, I’m not sure if it is really distinct), which is that all people throughout time are alike. It’s not necessarily groundless, but it is an assumption. There could be some symmetry breaking factor that determines your position that doesn’t simply align with “total humans that ever exist”, and thus renders using the “birth rank” inappropriate to determine what number you have. This thing doesn’t have to be related to reproduction though.
It’s not a distinct assumption. It’s the same assumption, but formulated in a terribly confusing manner as a lot of things in anthropics are.
The “likeness” is relevant for SSA reference class which is somewhat of a free parameter in the theory. The correct reference class is the group of people from which you could’ve been anyone. And this question is very much related to reproduction in case of Doomsday argument. I’ll be talking about reference classes and how it’s technically possible to salvage SSA with them in a future post.
I think the factors that determine your reference class can be related to changes over time in the environment you inhabit, not just how you are built. This is what I mean by not necessarily related to reproduction. If I cloned a billion people with the same cloning vat over 1000 years, how then would you determine reference class? But maybe something about the environment would narrow that reference class despite all the people being made by the same process (like the presence or absence of other things in the environment as they relate to the people coming out of the vat).
In principle—yes. Different settings of probability experiments naturally lead to different reference classes. But in case of DA this seem to boil down to the question of reproduction.
A person created by this vat may start from assuming that you are a random person from that billion and then adjust their credence based on available evidence as usual. Like if you checked the year of your creation, now you treat yourself as a random person from the people created in this vat specifically in this year. You can frame is as change of reference class or as simple bayesian update on the available evidence.