Ah, first: you DID claim that I “didn’t provide specific, uncontroversial examples” and I HAD given such for why Bayes’ Theorem is inadequate. Notice that you made your statement in this context:
<<”Bayes is persistently wrong”—about what, exactly?
Content like this should include specific, uncontroversial examples>>
In that context, where you precede “this” with my statement about Bayes, I naturally took “content like this” to be referring to my statement that “Bayes is persistently wrong.” I hope you can see how easy it would be for me to conclude such a thing, considering “this” refers to… the prior statement?
You now move your goal-posts by insisting that my statement “Rationalists repeatedly rely upon sparse evidence, while claiming certainty” was ACTUALLY the argument I had to support with specifics… while if I were to give such specifics, I would have betrayed individual confidences, which is unethical. So, no, I’ll continue to assert without specifics, for the sake of confidences, that “Rationalists repeatedly rely upon sparse evidence, while claiming certainty” because MULTIPLE rationalist over the past YEAR have done so, NOT an isolated incident or an off-hand joke, as you assume.
Your assumption that my “amalgam of rationalists I’ve met over the last year” was somehow a one-off or cursory remark is your OWN uncharitable interpretation; you are dismissing my repeated interactions with your community; such has been the norm. Similarly, in the EA Forum post “Doing EA Better”—a group of risk analysts had been spending a year trying to tell EA that “you’re doing risk-assessment wrong; those techniques are out-dated,” and EA members kept insisting their way was fine and right. Eventually, that nearly-dozen folks sat down and scribed an essay to EA… and EA pointedly ignored that fact they mentioned! “EA dismisses experts when experts tell EA they’re using out-dated techniques.” I’m seeing a similar pattern across the Rationalist community, NOT a one-off event or a casual remark; they were using Bayes’ Theorem improperly, as the substance of arguments made in response to me.
“As an aside, all the ways in which you claim that Bayes is wrong are… wrong?”
Bayesian Inference is a good and real thing. And, Bayes’ Theorem is an old formula, used in Bayesian Inference. AND Bayes’ Theorem cannot produce Confidence Intervals, nor will it allocate to minimize the cost of being wrong, nor does it make adjustments for samples’ bias toward the extrema. Those are all specific ways where “I just plug it into Bayes’ Theorem” is factually wrong. You keep claiming that my critique is wrong—but you only do so vaguely! You skip right past these failures of Bayes’ Theorem, each time I mention them. Check the math books: there is NO “question of what tool is best for a given job,” as you say—rather, Bayes’ Theorem alone is NEVER the tool. You’ll have to adjust in many ways, not just one. And if you don’t do so, you are in fact using an obsolete technique during your Bayesian Inference.
Ah, first: you DID claim that I “didn’t provide specific, uncontroversial examples” and I HAD given such for why Bayes’ Theorem is inadequate. Notice that you made your statement in this context:
<<”Bayes is persistently wrong”—about what, exactly?
Content like this should include specific, uncontroversial examples>>
In that context, where you precede “this” with my statement about Bayes, I naturally took “content like this” to be referring to my statement that “Bayes is persistently wrong.” I hope you can see how easy it would be for me to conclude such a thing, considering “this” refers to… the prior statement?
You now move your goal-posts by insisting that my statement “Rationalists repeatedly rely upon sparse evidence, while claiming certainty” was ACTUALLY the argument I had to support with specifics… while if I were to give such specifics, I would have betrayed individual confidences, which is unethical. So, no, I’ll continue to assert without specifics, for the sake of confidences, that “Rationalists repeatedly rely upon sparse evidence, while claiming certainty” because MULTIPLE rationalist over the past YEAR have done so, NOT an isolated incident or an off-hand joke, as you assume.
Your assumption that my “amalgam of rationalists I’ve met over the last year” was somehow a one-off or cursory remark is your OWN uncharitable interpretation; you are dismissing my repeated interactions with your community; such has been the norm. Similarly, in the EA Forum post “Doing EA Better”—a group of risk analysts had been spending a year trying to tell EA that “you’re doing risk-assessment wrong; those techniques are out-dated,” and EA members kept insisting their way was fine and right. Eventually, that nearly-dozen folks sat down and scribed an essay to EA… and EA pointedly ignored that fact they mentioned! “EA dismisses experts when experts tell EA they’re using out-dated techniques.” I’m seeing a similar pattern across the Rationalist community, NOT a one-off event or a casual remark; they were using Bayes’ Theorem improperly, as the substance of arguments made in response to me.
“As an aside, all the ways in which you claim that Bayes is wrong are… wrong?”
Bayesian Inference is a good and real thing. And, Bayes’ Theorem is an old formula, used in Bayesian Inference. AND Bayes’ Theorem cannot produce Confidence Intervals, nor will it allocate to minimize the cost of being wrong, nor does it make adjustments for samples’ bias toward the extrema. Those are all specific ways where “I just plug it into Bayes’ Theorem” is factually wrong. You keep claiming that my critique is wrong—but you only do so vaguely! You skip right past these failures of Bayes’ Theorem, each time I mention them. Check the math books: there is NO “question of what tool is best for a given job,” as you say—rather, Bayes’ Theorem alone is NEVER the tool. You’ll have to adjust in many ways, not just one. And if you don’t do so, you are in fact using an obsolete technique during your Bayesian Inference.