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VoiceOfRa comments on Probabilities Small Enough To Ignore: An attack on Pascal's Mugging - Less Wrong Discussion

20 Post author: Kaj_Sotala 16 September 2015 10:45AM

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Comment author: VoiceOfRa 29 September 2015 12:36:42AM 1 point [-]

Sure. But if you have an argument that some guy who shows me apparent magical powers has the power to torture 3^^^3 people with probability substantially over 1/3^^^3, then I bet I can turn it into an argument that anyone, with or without a demonstration of magical powers, with or without any sort of claim that they have such powers, has the power to torture 3^^^3 people with probability nearly as substantially over 1/3^^^3.

Correct. That still doesn't solve the decision theory problem, it makes it worse. Since you have to take into account the possibility that anyone you meet might have the power to torture (or reward with utopia) 3^^^3 people.

Comment author: gjm 29 September 2015 02:00:09AM 1 point [-]

It makes it worse or better, depending on whether you decide (1) that everyone has the power to do that with probability >~ 1/3^^^3 or (2) that no one has. I think #2 rather than #1 is correct.

Comment author: VoiceOfRa 29 September 2015 02:59:18AM 2 points [-]

Well, doing basic Bayes with a Kolmogorov priot gives you (1).

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