“I can make a reasonable estimate of the risk of being kidnapped or arrested and being tortured.
“There’s a lot less information about the risk of ems being tortured, and such information may never be available, since I think it’s unlikely that computers can be monitored to that extend.”
If we can’t make a reasonable estimate, what estimate do we make? The discounted validity of the estimate is incorporated in the prior probability. (Actually I’m not sure if this always works, but a consistent Bayesianism must so hold. Please correct me if this is wrong.)
My reaction to the most neutral form of the question about downloading—”If offered the certain opportunity of success at no cost, would I accept?”—Is “No.” The basis is my fear that I wouldn’t like the result. I justify it—perhaps after the fact—by assigning an equal a priori likelihood to a good and bad outcome. In Nancy’s terms, I’m saying that we have no ability to make a reasonable estimate. The advantage of putting it my way is that it implies a conclusion, rather than resulting in agnosticism (but at the cost of a less certain justification).
In general, I think people over-value the continuation of life. One consequence is that people put too little effort into mitigating the circumstances of their death—which many times, involves inclining it to come sooner rather than later.
If we can’t make a reasonable estimate, what estimate do we make?
What’s the status of error bars in doing this sort of reasoning? It seems to me that a probability of .5 +/- epsilon (a coin you have very good reason to think is honest) is a very different thing from .5 +/- .3 (outcome of an election in a country about which you only know that they have elections and the names of the candidates).
I’m not sure +/- .3 is reasonable—I think I’m using it to represent that people familiar with that country might have a good idea who’d win.
“I can make a reasonable estimate of the risk of being kidnapped or arrested and being tortured.
“There’s a lot less information about the risk of ems being tortured, and such information may never be available, since I think it’s unlikely that computers can be monitored to that extend.”
If we can’t make a reasonable estimate, what estimate do we make? The discounted validity of the estimate is incorporated in the prior probability. (Actually I’m not sure if this always works, but a consistent Bayesianism must so hold. Please correct me if this is wrong.)
My reaction to the most neutral form of the question about downloading—”If offered the certain opportunity of success at no cost, would I accept?”—Is “No.” The basis is my fear that I wouldn’t like the result. I justify it—perhaps after the fact—by assigning an equal a priori likelihood to a good and bad outcome. In Nancy’s terms, I’m saying that we have no ability to make a reasonable estimate. The advantage of putting it my way is that it implies a conclusion, rather than resulting in agnosticism (but at the cost of a less certain justification).
In general, I think people over-value the continuation of life. One consequence is that people put too little effort into mitigating the circumstances of their death—which many times, involves inclining it to come sooner rather than later.
What’s the status of error bars in doing this sort of reasoning? It seems to me that a probability of .5 +/- epsilon (a coin you have very good reason to think is honest) is a very different thing from .5 +/- .3 (outcome of an election in a country about which you only know that they have elections and the names of the candidates).
I’m not sure +/- .3 is reasonable—I think I’m using it to represent that people familiar with that country might have a good idea who’d win.