g_pepper comments on Conjunction Fallacy - Less Wrong

25 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 19 September 2007 01:54AM

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Comment author: Sonder_Wand 12 April 2015 04:19:53AM 0 points [-]

Is this really a fallacy? In the USSR and Poland case, we might take the probability space in (1) to exclude an invasion of Poland, and the space in (2) to include one. Then the claims are perfectly consistent, since the probability space changes; people just reason with respect to "stereotypical" alternatives.

Comment author: g_pepper 13 April 2015 12:05:27AM 2 points [-]

we might take the probability space in (1) to exclude an invasion of Poland, and the space in (2) to include one

That seems like an unjustified interpretation, since, according to the OP:

Two different experimental groups were respectively asked to rate the probability of two different statements, each group seeing only one statement:

  1. "A complete suspension of diplomatic relations between the USA and the Soviet Union, sometime in 1983."
  2. "A Russian invasion of Poland, and a complete suspension of diplomatic relations between the USA and the Soviet Union, sometime in 1983."

Since the subjects receiving statement 1 do not even see statement 2, they would have no reason to exclude the possibility of an invasion of Poland from statement 1.

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