Proof of Immortality II

[John Jones]

You have officially crossed over into full woo. I doubt that anything you say following this will matter much in this forum.

 

[The Sparrow]

...
1. There is no direct evidence for OFL (one, finite, life); the only evidence for OFL is circumstantial. ....

What would classify as 'direct evidence'? What would you accept as evidence we have only 1 life? What would you consider 'proof'?

 

[Agatha]

Agatha,

- This should get me started.

1. There is no direct evidence for OFL (one, finite, life); the only evidence for OFL is circumstantial. We infer that there is no other life for each of us than the one each of us is currently experiencing because 1) we think we would remember them if there were – and because 2) we think there is nothing immaterial.

Or, more likely, because we are familiar with the fact that we were each born, we will all one day die, that our consciousnesses are emergent properties of our living neurosystems, and that no evidence has ever been shown to suggest that dead consciousnesses somehow recur.

2. That the likelihood of your current existence given the one, finite, life (at most) scenario is 7 billion over an unimaginably large number is evidence itself that the one, finite, life (at most) scenario is wrong. Any actual number as the denominator of the likelihood of your current existence given ~OFL pales in comparison to the unimaginably large number as the denominator of the likelihood of your current existence given OFL.

No. Just no. We've been through all this, and your mathematical ideas are untenable. Let me try to explain.
If, 52 years ago my parents had written down the registration number of a car that I would one day own, the odds against them happening on the correct plate would be infinitesimally small. Indeed, the format for UK registration numbers has changed several times in that time and they would not have known how they would change in the future.

The likelihood of my owning any particular registration number when looked at before the fact would be similar to your "7 billion over unimaginably large". However, that does not mean that registration plates are reincarnated, or are anything special.

Many things are unlikely before the fact, but once they happen the likelihood is 1.

3. Then there are black holes, dark matter, multiverses, singularities, quantum entanglement, the anthropic principle, consciousness, particle waves, the relativity of time, the curvature of spacetime, life, etc. -- and possibly 7 physical dimensions that we can’t see and “numinous.”

None of which have any bearing on this discussion, unless it is your contention that just because some things are strange, any strange things are therefore real.

4. NDEs make for direct evidence for ~OFL, and some are credible.

This has already been addressed in your first immortality thread, but even credible NDEs are not evidence for ~OFL. They are evidence for a known physical response to a lack of oxygen to the brain, and they are culture-dependent which tends to support them being hallucinatory experiences caused by lack of oxygen. If you claim they are evidence for ~OFL, please explain exactly how something that happens prior to death, reported only when the person does not die, which has a physical explanation and which varies by culture has anything to do with the persistence of consciousness after death.

5. OOBEs make for direct evidence for ~OFL, and some are credible.

Again this was addressed. No OOBE has ever been shown to see anything other than what the person is able to view from their actual position. All the evidence points to OOBEs being halluinations brought on by stress, fear or drugs. I've had one myself, and I can assure you it was an hallucination brought on by stress and pethidine.

6. Claims of reincarnation make for direct evidence for ~OFL, and some are credible.

I've never seen a credible claim, do you have any? Not anecdotal, one that has been properly investigated.

7. We humans process data in two different ways – analytically and holistically. Each of us, especially we men, tend to be dominated by one way of thinking or the other. Western education teaches towards analytic thinking -- so those who are dominated by analytic thinking are more likely to do well in western schools than those who are dominated by holistic thinking. As the analytic thinkers advance through western schools, they become more dominated by analytic thinking. The belief in what we call “transcendence” is what makes a philosophy religious. Holistic thinking is responsible for our ‘sense’ of transcendence. It would appear that either analytic thinkers tend to be transcendence-blind or holistic thinkers hallucinate…
8. Many of our great thinkers of the past seem to have been ‘bilingual’ in regard to their thinking.

Pop-psychology hogwash, if I may be blunt.

 

[JayUtah]

Pop-psychology hogwash, if I may be blunt.

Well, there is such a thing as holistic thinking. It just doesn't have anything to do with what Jabba described, nor anything to do with his argument. Holistic thinking is simply thinking at a broad scope. It has nothing to do with supposed limitations of "western" education. It has nothing to do with religion. It doesn't eschew the use of evidence and logical reasoning.

Just as he co-opted "circumstantial evidence" to refer to his particular brand of preconception, he's co-opting terms from the psychology literature to apply to a sort of anti-intellectual elitism foisted by a lot of fringe theorists. The intent is to insinuate that if you don't grasp the genius of his argument, you're just not sufficiently enlightened.

 

[Mojo]

Well, there is such a thing as holistic thinking. It just doesn't have anything to do with what Jabba described, nor anything to do with his argument. Holistic thinking is simply thinking at a broad scope. It has nothing to do with supposed limitations of "western" education. It has nothing to do with religion. It doesn't eschew the use of evidence and logical reasoning.

It's one if those words that are frequently misused. When used by proponents of alternative medicine, the term "holistic" can usually be taken to mean "demonstrably ineffective".

I'm amazed that Jabba isn't calling his debating technique "holistic".

 

[MRC_Hans]

What would classify as 'direct evidence'? What would you accept as evidence we have only 1 life? What would you consider 'proof'?

Funny how in this thread, circumstantial evidence has litte value, while over in the Shroud thread ......

Hans

 

[I Am The Scum]

So if the odds of one life are 1/7 billion, aren't the odds of two lives 1/7 billion²?

 

[The Sparrow]

Funny how in this thread, circumstantial evidence has litte value, while over in the Shroud thread ......

Hans

Indeed. hmmmmmmmmmm

 

[I Am The Scum]

Funny how in this thread, circumstantial evidence has litte value, while over in the Shroud thread ......

Hans

That's just some silly tablecloth. This is a matter of life and death!

Or... life and life and life and life and death.

 

[Jabba]

Agatha,

...2. That the likelihood of your current existence given the one, finite, life (at most) scenario is 7 billion over an unimaginably large number is evidence itself that the one, finite, life (at most) scenario is wrong. Any actual number as the denominator of the likelihood of your current existence given ~OFL pales in comparison to the unimaginably large number as the denominator of the likelihood of your current existence given OFL...

... No. Just no. We've been through all this, and your mathematical ideas are untenable. Let me try to explain.
If, 52 years ago my parents had written down the registration number of a car that I would one day own, the odds against them happening on the correct plate would be infinitesimally small. Indeed, the format for UK registration numbers has changed several times in that time and they would not have known how they would change in the future.

The likelihood of my owning any particular registration number when looked at before the fact would be similar to your "7 billion over unimaginably large". However, that does not mean that registration plates are reincarnated, or are anything special.

Many things are unlikely before the fact, but once they happen the likelihood is 1...

Agatha,
- From Wikipedia,
Bayesian inference is a method of statistical inference in which Bayes' theorem is used to update the probability for a hypothesis as more evidence or information becomes available.
- In our case E is the new information and, in a sense at least, its "probability" of existence is, in fact, 1.00. However, in Bayesian inference, we're looking for the effect that its actual existence has on the (posterior) probability of H. And, to do that, we need to figure the "likelihood" of E, given that H is true. And, that likelihood is virtually zero.

 

[Belz...]

- Since you guys all think that the opinion that we each have but one finite, life (at most) is possibly wrong

It's not.

 

[JayUtah]

And, to do that, we need to figure the "likelihood" of E, given that H is true.

No, that is not how you formulate a Bayesian analysis.

I use Bayesian analysis extensively in my profession, as it is the basis of one form of machine intelligence. You have no idea what you're talking about. Moreover, you seem to believe no one here can possibly know that you're faking it.

And, that likelihood is virtually zero.

No. You don't get to simply pluck numbers out of your hindquarters and pretend Bayes lets you treat it as some sort of proof.

 

[Belz...]

Agatha,
- From Wikipedia,
Bayesian inference is a method of statistical inference in which Bayes' theorem is used to update the probability for a hypothesis as more evidence or information becomes available.
- In our case E is the new information and, in a sense at least, its "probability" of existence is, in fact, 1.00. However, in Bayesian inference, we're looking for the effect that its actual existence has on the (posterior) probability of H. And, to do that, we need to figure the "likelihood" of E, given that H is true. And, that likelihood is virtually zero.

Your use of statistics is akin to you using a hammer to draw a picture on a piece of paper and hitting yourself in the eye every time.

 

[I Am The Scum]

Agatha,
- From Wikipedia,
Bayesian inference is a method of statistical inference in which Bayes' theorem is used to update the probability for a hypothesis as more evidence or information becomes available.
- In our case E is the new information and, in a sense at least, its "probability" of existence is, in fact, 1.00. However, in Bayesian inference, we're looking for the effect that its actual existence has on the (posterior) probability of H. And, to do that, we need to figure the "likelihood" of E, given that H is true. And, that likelihood is virtually zero.

You have no idea how wrong you are. Seriously, just look at one of the examples on the wiki page of Bayes' theorem^WP:

The entire output of a factory is produced on three machines. The three machines account for 20%, 30%, and 50% of the output, respectively. The fraction of defective items produced is this: for the first machine, 5%; for the second machine, 3%; for the third machine, 1%. If an item is chosen at random from the total output and is found to be defective, what is the probability that it was produced by the third machine?

A solution is as follows. Let Ai denote the event that a randomly chosen item was made by the ith machine (for i = 1,2,3). Let B denote the event that a randomly chosen item is defective. Then, we are given the following information:

P(A1) = 0.2, P(A2) = 0.3, P(A3) = 0.5.

If the item was made by machine A1, then the probability that it is defective is 0.05; that is, P(B | A1) = 0.05. Overall, we have

P(B | A1) = 0.05, P(B | A2) = 0.03, P(B | A3) = 0.01.

To answer the original question, we first find P(B). That can be done in the following way:

P(B) = Σi P(B | Ai) P(Ai) = (0.05)(0.2) + (0.03)(0.3) + (0.01)(0.5) = 0.024.

Hence 2.4% of the total output of the factory is defective.

We are given that B has occurred, and we want to calculate the conditional probability of A3. By Bayes' theorem,

P(A3 | B) = P(B | A3) P(A3)/P(B) = (0.01)(0.50)/(0.024) = 5/24.

Given that the item is defective, the probability that it was made by the third machine is only 5/24. Although machine 3 produces half of the total output, it produces a much smaller fraction of the defective items. Hence the knowledge that the item selected was defective enables us to replace the prior probability P(A3) = 1/2 by the smaller posterior probability P(A3 | B) = 5/24.

Do you honestly think that what you are doing is anything close to the above?

 

[jond]

Just took a little TARDIS trip back through this thread. It is astonishing how many excellent posts were made and have been completely ignored by Jabba. It really is sad to see someone so willfully ignorant.

 

[JayUtah]

Seriously, just look at one of the examples on the wiki page of Bayes' theorem^WP

Those are actually pretty toy examples. They have more to do with simple conditional probability (to which Bayes tangentially applies) than with anything that's actually powerful and predictive in Bayesian methods.

Do you honestly think that what you are doing is anything close to the above?

Watching Jabba attempt to explain Bayesian inference is like watching a dog trying to operate a forklift. There is simply no appreciable depth or sophistication to what he's attempting.

Then, entirely aside from that, is the very important notion that no part of Bayes' work applies to doing what Jabba is attempting to do -- which is to transform simply made-up numbers to something that approaches a working statistical model. Statistics is the rigorous mathematical treatment of uncertainty, but there's a huge difference between uncertainty and unprovable subjective belief. You can't Bayes your way to a soul, no matter how desperately you want to believe in one.

 

[JayUtah]

It is astonishing how many excellent posts were made and have been completely ignored by Jabba.

Back when Hugh Farey was stumbling through Bayes alongside Jabba, I took the opportunity to write several short-chapter length essays on what Bayes gives you and how it's typically used in real-world situations. Naturally neither Jabba nor Hugh addressed them. Hugh acknowledged them, at least. But Jabba simply let them pass in silence.

It really is sad to see someone so willfully ignorant.

I have no sympathy for him, although I share your general disappointment. Jabba's ignorance is self-inflicted and he bears the legitimate consequence from it, which is public ridicule. This is why ridicule exists. And many of us are fairly convinced this is a calculated posture. Jabba's meta-arguments vacillate between telling us how much better a thinker he is than the rest of us, and begging our indulgence because he's a feeble old man who just can't get to all the rebuttals. Such ham-fisted attempts to play both sides of the game are hard to ignore.

 

[jond]

Back when Hugh Farey was stumbling through Bayes alongside Jabba, I took the opportunity to write several short-chapter length essays on what Bayes gives you and how it's typically used in real-world situations. Naturally neither Jabba nor Hugh addressed them. Hugh acknowledged them, at least. But Jabba simply let them pass in silence.

I know, and I greatly appreciate your considerable efforts in that debacle. It just such ignored material that gets me a bit riled up!

I have no sympathy for him, although I share your general disappointment. Jabba's ignorance is self-inflicted and he bears the legitimate consequence from it, which is public ridicule. This is why ridicule exists. And many of us are fairly convinced this is a calculated posture. Jabba's meta-arguments vacillate between telling us how much better a thinker he is than the rest of us, and begging our indulgence because he's a feeble old man who just can't get to all the rebuttals. Such ham-fisted attempts to play both sides of the game are hard to ignore.

Indeed. Still, many good things have come from this thread. Not least of which is the recommendation of Sam Kean's "The Tale of Duelling Neurosurgeons" and VS Ramachandran's "Phantoms in the Brain."

 

[JayUtah]

I know, and I greatly appreciate your considerable efforts in that debacle. It just such ignored material that gets me a bit riled up!

But all these contributions have the intended effect. They provide publicly accessible, independent proof that Jabba can persist in this debate only by ignoring the vast majority of things said to him. It proves that he's effectively standing there with his fingers in ears, eyes closed, yelling "La la la, I can't hear you." This makes his subsequent complaints fall flat when he whines of shabby treatment and closed minds.

 

[Jabba]

...
2. That the likelihood of your current existence given the one, finite, life (at most) scenario is 7 billion over an unimaginably large number is evidence itself that the one, finite, life (at most) scenario is wrong. Any actual number as the denominator of the likelihood of your current existence given ~OFL pales in comparison to the unimaginably large number as the denominator of the likelihood of your current existence given OFL...

No. Just no. We've been through all this, and your mathematical ideas are untenable. Let me try to explain.
If, 52 years ago my parents had written down the registration number of a car that I would one day own, the odds against them happening on the correct plate would be infinitesimally small. Indeed, the format for UK registration numbers has changed several times in that time and they would not have known how they would change in the future.

The likelihood of my owning any particular registration number when looked at before the fact would be similar to your "7 billion over unimaginably large". However, that does not mean that registration plates are reincarnated, or are anything special.

Many things are unlikely before the fact, but once they happen the likelihood is 1...

Agatha,
- From Wikipedia,
Bayesian inference is a method of statistical inference in which Bayes' theorem is used to update the probability for a hypothesis as more evidence or information becomes available.
- In our case E is the new information and, in a sense at least, its "probability" of existence is, in fact, 1.00. However, in Bayesian inference, we're looking for the effect that its actual existence has on the (posterior) probability of H. And, to do that, we need to figure the "likelihood" of E, given that H is true. And, that likelihood is virtually zero.

No, that is not how you formulate a Bayesian analysis.
I use Bayesian analysis extensively in my profession, as it is the basis of one form of machine intelligence. You have no idea what you're talking about. Moreover, you seem to believe no one here can possibly know that you're faking it.



No. You don't get to simply pluck numbers out of your hindquarters and pretend Bayes lets you treat it as some sort of proof.

Jay,
- If we want to determine the posterior probability of an existing hypothesis after new relevant info becomes available, don't we need to know the likelihood of the new info given the old hypothesis?