Frequentism isn't this view's foil
Err, actually, yes it is. The frequentist interpretation of probability makes the claim that probability theory can only be used in situations involving large numbers of repeatable trials, or selection from a large population. William Feller:
There is no place in our system for speculations concerning the probability that the sun will rise tomorrow. Before speaking of it we should have to agree on an (idealized) model which would presumably run along the lines "out of infinitely many worlds one is selected at random..." Little imagination is required to construct such a model, but it appears both uninteresting and meaningless.
Or to quote from the essay coined the term frequentist:
The essential distinction between the frequentists and the [Bayesians] is, I think, that the former, in an effort to avoid anything savouring of matters of opinion, seek to define probability in terms of the objective properties of a population, real or hypothetical, whereas the latter do not.
Frequentism is only relevant to epistemological debates in a negative sense: unlike Aristotelianism and Anton-Wilsonism, which both present their own theories of epistemology, frequentism's relevance is almost only in claiming that Bayesianism is wrong. (Frequentism separately presents much more complicated and less obviously wrong claims within statistics and probability; these are not relevant, given that frequentism's sole relevance to epistemology is its claim that no theory of statistics and probability could be a suitable basis for an epistemology, since there are many events they simply don't apply to.)
(I agree that it would be useful to separate out the three versions of Bayesianism, whose claims, while related, do not need to all be true or false at the same time. However, all three are substantively opposed to one or both of the views labelled frequentist.)
The frequentist interpretation of probability makes the claim that probability theory can only be used in situations involving large numbers of repeatable trials, or selection from a large population.
Yes, but frequentists have zero problems with hypothetical trials or populations.
Do note that for most well-specified statistical problems the Bayesians and the frequentists will come to the same conclusions. Differently expressed, likely, but not contradicting each other.
A few notes about the site mechanics
A few notes about the community
If English is not your first language, don't let that make you afraid to post or comment. You can get English help on Discussion- or Main-level posts by sending a PM to one of the following users (use the "send message" link on the upper right of their user page). Either put the text of the post in the PM, or just say that you'd like English help and you'll get a response with an email address.
* Normal_Anomaly
* Randaly
* shokwave
* Barry Cotter
A note for theists: you will find the Less Wrong community to be predominantly atheist, though not completely so, and most of us are genuinely respectful of religious people who keep the usual community norms. It's worth saying that we might think religion is off-topic in some places where you think it's on-topic, so be thoughtful about where and how you start explicitly talking about it; some of us are happy to talk about religion, some of us aren't interested. Bear in mind that many of us really, truly have given full consideration to theistic claims and found them to be false, so starting with the most common arguments is pretty likely just to annoy people. Anyhow, it's absolutely OK to mention that you're religious in your welcome post and to invite a discussion there.
A list of some posts that are pretty awesome
I recommend the major sequences to everybody, but I realize how daunting they look at first. So for purposes of immediate gratification, the following posts are particularly interesting/illuminating/provocative and don't require any previous reading:
More suggestions are welcome! Or just check out the top-rated posts from the history of Less Wrong. Most posts at +50 or more are well worth your time.
Welcome to Less Wrong, and we look forward to hearing from you throughout the site!
Note from orthonormal: MBlume and other contributors wrote the original version of this welcome post, and I've edited it a fair bit. If there's anything I should add or update on this post (especially broken links), please send me a private message—I may not notice a comment on the post. Finally, once this gets past 500 comments, anyone is welcome to copy and edit this intro to start the next welcome thread.