Nick_Tarleton comments on Reference class of the unclassreferenceable - Less Wrong

25 Post author: taw 08 January 2010 04:13AM

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Comment author: taw 08 January 2010 11:04:23AM 6 points [-]

I entertain the notion that outside view might be a bad way of analyzing some situations, the post is a question on what this class might look like, and how do we know a situation belongs to such class? I'd definitely take outside view as a default type of reasoning - inside view by definition has no evidence of even as little as lack of systemic bias behind it.

The way you describe my heuristic is not accurate. There are cases where something highly unusual happen, but these tend to be extremely difficult to reliably predict - even if they're really easy to explain away as bound to happen with benefit of hindsight.

For example I've heard plenty of people being absolutely certain that fall of the Soviet Union was virtually certain and caused by something they like to believe - usually without even the basic understanding of facts, but many experts make identical mistake. The fact is - nobody predicted it (ignoring background noise of people who "predict" such things year in year out) - and relevant reference classes showed quite low (not zero, but far lower than one) probability of it happening.

Comment author: Nick_Tarleton 08 January 2010 11:25:29AM *  3 points [-]

I entertain the notion that outside view might be a bad way of analyzing some situations, the post is a question on what this class might look like, and how do we know a situation belongs to such class?

The Outside View's Domain

inside view by definition has no evidence of even as little as lack of systemic bias behind it.

Not 'by definition'; if you justify using IV by noting that it's worked on this class of problems before, you're still using IV. Semantic quibbles aside, this really sounds to me like someone trying to believe something interpersonally justifiable (or more justifiable than their opponent), not be right.