You're looking at Less Wrong's discussion board. This includes all posts, including those that haven't been promoted to the front page yet. For more information, see About Less Wrong.

timtyler comments on People neglect small probability events - Less Wrong Discussion

11 Post author: XiXiDu 02 July 2011 10:54AM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Comments (67)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: timtyler 05 July 2011 07:40:21AM *  1 point [-]

The issue is not really about standard deviations, it is that probability is subjective. Humans are in a very bad position to determine this probability - we have little relevant experience, we can't usefully bet on it, and if there are differences or disagreement, it is very difficult to tell who is right. The "human probability" seems practically worthless - a reflection of our ignorance, not anything with much to do with the event. We need that probability to guide our actions - but we can hardly expect two people to agree on it.

The nearest think I can think of which is well defined is the probability that our descendants put on the event retrospectively. A probability estimate by wiser and better informed creatures of the chances of a world like our own making it. That estimate could - quite plausibly - be very low or very high.

Comment author: Manfred 05 July 2011 05:46:58PM *  1 point [-]

Given a certain chunk of information, the evidence in it isn't subjective. Priors may be subjective, although there is a class of cases where they're objective too. "It is difficult to tell who is right" is an informative statement about the human decision process, but not really informative about probability.

Comment author: timtyler 05 July 2011 08:47:17PM 0 points [-]

Given a certain chunk of information, the evidence in it isn't subjective. Priors may be subjective, although there is a class of cases where they're objective too.

Well, two agents with the same priors can easily come to different conclusions as a result of observing the same evidence. Different cognitive limitations can result in that happening.