Rather, I’m saying probability theory points at a correct way to reason for ideal agents, which humans can try to approximate.
Probability theory does not do that. It does not make your reasoning robust against unknown unknowns.
In this case, I think there’s already more than enough evidence available for an ideal agent to conclude from a cursory inspection that the observed evidence is not well-explained by actual aliens.
From my perspective it doesn’t look like there is an explanation that well-explains the available evidence. That goes both for alien-involving explanations and for non-alien-involving explanations. That’s what makes the situation confusing.
But you don’t need to be an ideal agent to draw similar conclusions: you merely need to apply some effort and reasoning skills which are pretty common among LW readers, but not so common outside these circles
I’m unsure why you believe that LW readers are that much better at reasoning than highly promoted intelligence analysts.
Probability theory does not do that. It does not make your reasoning robust against unknown unknowns.
From my perspective it doesn’t look like there is an explanation that well-explains the available evidence. That goes both for alien-involving explanations and for non-alien-involving explanations. That’s what makes the situation confusing.
I’m unsure why you believe that LW readers are that much better at reasoning than highly promoted intelligence analysts.