scmbradley comments on Dutch Books and Decision Theory: An Introduction to a Long Conversation - Less Wrong

19 Post author: Jack 21 December 2010 04:55AM

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Comment author: scmbradley 18 January 2012 03:31:04PM 0 points [-]

What the Dutch book theorem gives you are restrictions on the kinds of will-to-wager numbers you can exhibit and still avoid sure loss. It's a big leap to claim that these numbers perfectly reflect what your degrees of belief ought to be.

But that's not really what's at issue. The point I was making is that even among imperfect reasoners, there are better and worse ways to reason. We've sorted out the perfect case now. It's been done to death. Let's look at what kind of imperfect reasoning is best.

Comment author: Jack 18 January 2012 08:55:57PM 1 point [-]

What the Dutch book theorem gives you are restrictions on the kinds of will-to-wager numbers you can exhibit and still avoid sure loss. It's a big leap to claim that these numbers perfectly reflect what your degrees of belief ought to be.

Yes. This was the subject of half the post.

But that's not really what's at issue. The point I was making is that even among imperfect reasoners, there are better and worse ways to reason. We've sorted out the perfect case now. It's been done to death. Let's look at what kind of imperfect reasoning is best.

It actually is what was at issue in this year old post and ensuing discussion. There is no consensus justification for Bayesian epistemology. If you would rather talk about imperfect reasoning strategies than the philosophical foundations of ideal reasoning than you should go ahead and write a post about it. It isn't all that relevant as a reply to my comment.