Proof of Immortality, the IV league

[abaddon]

LL,

- We keep missing each other...

- First, I'm claiming that a short account of a particular incident or event (an anecdote) can, indeed, increase or decrease the probability of an hypothesis.
- Then, I'm claiming that some such accounts given by NDE subjects do, in fact, increase the probability of immateriality.
- Specifically, I claim that accounts of confirmed events and situations that the knowledge of which the subject could not have gained through normal sensory input or lucky guessing increases the probability of immateriality.
- Such a subject could have had a lucky guess, or the subject and/or the witness(es) could be lying -- and in evaluating the claims, the likelihood of such possibilities must be taken into account.
- My claim is that there are numerous such cases that appear to pass that test.
- And, until I hear that I should decrease my quoting of copyrighted material, I'll start quoting more cases.

Well, 6 weeks ago, I broke my ankle (still in plaster). I had to have plates and pins inserted under anaesthesia. When they were closing up, I regained some level of consciousness. I observed a team of masked surgeons operating on a disembodied leg. I knew it was not my leg, because it couldn't possibly be my leg. At that distance and angle, one would have to entirely separate my right leg from my body. It seemed to me that I was observing a disembodied leg levitating in the air some 10-12 feet from my body while I was also observing from some 10-12 feet from my own body. My perception was that it was not my leg, couldn't possibly be my leg since I am not 24 foot long and do not bend in those impossible directions. Ergo, it was someone else's leg and I was an outside observer of someone else's operation.

So my thoughts went thusly...

What's going on?
Why is there a leg in mid air? It clearly isn't mine. It's to far away to be even vaguely anatomically possible.
Why are these surgeons operating on a levitating disembodied leg?
Why am I even seeing this? I'm on eye level with the surgical team.
WTF is going on? At one point I am looking down on myself.
Oh, right. It is my leg, I'm just spaced out on the drugs.

Soothing voice comes from the left, "calm down", ups the dose and out I go again.

This is an obvious OOBE experience, right? Wrong. This is a drug induced faction. An anecdote. Did I leave my body? Nope, I simply gleaned enough data for my brain to make up nonsense. Was it traumatic? Not at all. I dispassionately observed as they stitched me up (until I was put out again).

 

[Loss Leader]

LL,

- We keep missing each other...

We're not missing each other in any way whatsoever. I have understood all of your claims and answered each in detail multiple times. You have patently ignored everything I've said. Witness this complete reset below. You just restate all the things we've already been over.

- First, I'm claiming that a short account of a particular incident or event (an anecdote) can, indeed, increase or decrease the probability of an hypothesis.

You are wrong. Investigate the scientific method and read about how to craft properly controlled experiments.

- Then, I'm claiming that some such accounts given by NDE subjects do, in fact, increase the probability of immateriality

You are wrong. Even if everything in all the accounts you read were true, immateriality is not necessarily true as a result, nor is mere material neurosystem operation necessarily false. The AWARE study that you yourself cited showed that conscious or unconscious perception can and does occur at far lower brain activity measures than was previously thought possible.

- Specifically, I claim that accounts of confirmed events and situations that the knowledge of which the subject could not have gained through normal sensory input or lucky guessing increases the probability of immateriality.

You are wrong. Whatever you think "confirmed events" mean, they are not on display in some third-hand work specifically created to support the author's preconceptions. Tell me the name and phone number of any person mentioned in the book as having an NDE.

- Such a subject could have had a lucky guess, or the subject and/or the witness(es) could be lying -- and in evaluating the claims, the likelihood of such possibilities must be taken into account.

Anything that makes the conclusion less than necessarily true, makes the conclusion worthless.

- My claim is that there are numerous such cases that appear to pass that test.

Guess which word above shows that you are not thinking scientifically. The sun appears to revolve around the earth. Mars appears to move backwards. Fire appears to destroy matter.

- And, until I hear that I should decrease my quoting of copyrighted material, I'll start quoting more cases.

Why? Honestly, why? Are any of them documented well enough that they could be researched? Do any of them rule out guesses, selective memory, "recovered" memory, cherry-picking, low brain-activity, or any other confounding factor? Are any of them accompanied by EKGs, EEGs, and other objective measures? Are any of them even presented in standardized medical writing?

There is no reason for you to tell ghost stories in the hopes that someone will agree that one of them sounds spooky. It's not logical and it's not helpful.

 

[Jabba]

How did they rule out lucky guesses?

Mojo,
- Mostly, how unlikely the guesses would be. For instance, the penny on top of the cabinet.

That doesn't rule out a lucky guess.

Mojo,
- I suppose that it doesn't rule out a lucky guess, but doesn't it reduce the likelihood of a lucky guess?
- What if the subject was correct in claiming that the penny was minted in 1985?

 

[JayUtah]

...but doesn't it reduce the likelihood of a lucky guess?

Irrelevant. The question is whether the rate of correct guesses rises above chance to a statistically significant degree. Then and only then can you claim that something other than chance should be considered. But you can't do that, because all you have is a bunch of cherry-picked and post-processed anecdotes of dubious origin.

What if the subject was correct in claiming that the penny was minted in 1985?

Same as above. You're trying to amp up the subjective "wow!" factor as a way of avoiding the actual problem. Obviously if you expand the details that must be guessed correctly under controlled conditions in order to qualify as a "hit" then you could defensibly suppose it would be easier under those controls to demonstrate a rate of success greater than chance.

But for you that's a castle in the sky because your stories don't approach that level of detail, have no quantitative controls to form a suitable basis, and have no qualitative control to prove they actually happened exactly as claimed. Until you can achieve that -- which you refuse even to attempt -- then it doesn't matter what other hypothetical body of evidence might be considered probative. We're all too familiar with your argument that goes, "If I had any evidence, would you agree that it would be evidence?"

 

[Belz...]

Mojo,
- I suppose that it doesn't rule out a lucky guess, but doesn't it reduce the likelihood of a lucky guess?
- What if the subject was correct in claiming that the penny was minted in 1985?

"Please, please, please. Tell me something I want to hear!"

 

[JoeMorgue]

What if the subject was correct in claiming that the penny was minted in 1985?

What if pigs had wings?

 

[JoeMorgue]

And Jabba weren't you supposed to be proving immortality using statistics? Have you completely forgotten about that?

 

[JayUtah]

And Jabba weren't you supposed to be proving immortality using statistics? Have you completely forgotten about that?

That's sort of where we were with this until the tangent took on a life of his own. All these equivocations were once motivated by providing a rationale either for P(H) or for P(E|H). Dividing by infinity (or sometimes just billions) was meant to support the case that P(E|H) must be very small. In like manner, begging a measly amount of credulity that NDEs could be evidence of immortality was meant to support the case that P(~H) could be 1%. Jabba has flatly stated that all he needs is someone to stipulate to that 1% and his Bayesian inference takes care of the rest by a likelihood ratio fancifully based on assumptions of infinity. So now he's trying every dishonest stunt in the book to trick his critics into agreeing to an actual probability of 1% that there exists an immortal soul.

 

[theprestige]

- What if the subject was correct in claiming that the penny was minted in 1985?

We're all too familiar with your argument that goes, "If I had any evidence, would you agree that it would be evidence?"

"Please, please, please. Tell me something I want to hear!"

What if pigs had wings?

If I had some gasoline, I could drive to Las Vegas. If I had a car.

 

[Squeegee Beckenheim]

Mojo,
- I suppose that it doesn't rule out a lucky guess, but doesn't it reduce the likelihood of a lucky guess?
- What if the subject was correct in claiming that the penny was minted in 1985?

What if a nurse threw the penny up on top of the cabinet after hearing the story but before anybody looked for the penny?

BTW, having quoted your post, I feel the need to tell you that if you put something in 11 italics boxes it doesn't become any more italicised than if you'd just put it in the one.

 

[Slowvehicle]

What if pigs had wings?

...they'd have 6 legs?

 

[abaddon]

...they'd have 6 legs?

What does that work out at in terms of pork chops?

 

[jt512]

And there you go. This is the bit about not judging anecdotes (or more precisely, there proffered explanations) in a vacuum.

I let it go when you commented in the other thread that the evidential weight of new information should depend on context, that is, what we already know. That's actually wrong. What we already know goes into the prior probability. The evidential weight of any new information updates our prior probability. But it is fundamental to Bayesian inference that the weight of the new information is independent of the prior. In other words, two people with different prior odds for a hypothesis, should always be able to agree on the amount that newly received information should affect those odds.

To put it another way, if two people with different prior odds for a hypothesis each obtain the same new information, their odds should change by the same amount. This is automatic in formal Bayesian analysis, where there is a formal mathematical model for the data likelihood; but the same principle applies here. The weight of the new evidence stands on its, irrespective of prior opinions about the hypothesis.

 

[Slowvehicle]

What does that work out at in terms of pork chops?

'Bout the same number of chops...but you get 4 hams and 4 Boston Butts....and an odd, Y-shaped loin strip.

 

[Garrette]

I let it go when you commented in the other thread that the evidential weight of new information should depend on context, that is, what we already know. That's actually wrong. What we already know goes into the prior probability. The evidential weight of any new information updates our prior probability.

It is determining that evidential weight which is at question here, and I do not think you have escaped the context issue. You are acting as if the NDE anecdotes (which is what Jabba is going for) or the God-water people (if we're sticking with the latest example) are in themselves something separate when they are, in fact, not.

There have been NDE claims before which have not withstood scrutiny, and their have been God-vision claims before which have not withstood scrutiny.

What you are suggesting is exactly akin to saying that we must accept it as positive evidence of supernatural ability when someone says he saw a woman on stage sawn in half and then restored.

But it is fundamental to Bayesian inference that the weight of the new information is independent of the prior.

It isn't new information; it is simply newly packaged.

In other words, two people with different prior odds for a hypothesis, should always be able to agree on the amount that newly received information should affect those odds.

Is that what is happening here? Obviously no such agreement has been reached. One reason is that no one can provide any reasonable adjustment to the prior odds.

Let's ask the question a bit more fairly.

Person A and Person B have a Bayesian equation on which they agree with the priors.

Person A finds a book of Grimm's Fairy Tales with which he is previously unfamiliar. "Holy crap!" he says. "I didn't know there were dwarves and witches and magic slippers. This changes the prior odds!"

Person B has known about Grimm's Fairy Tales for years before the Bayesian equation was ever conceived and knows them to be untrue. Regardless how much Person B points out that the GFT are not new evidence Person A insists.

Where is the agreement on that?

We can expand it. Assume it isn't Grimm's Fairy Tales that Person A finds but something else written after the Bayesian equation was crafted so it is, indeed, new. If the new book mentions witches and magic slippers must it be added to the priors? By how much does it increase the prior odds?

To put it another way, if two people with different prior odds for a hypothesis each obtain the same new information, their odds should change by the same amount. This is automatic in formal Bayesian analysis, where there is a formal mathematical model for the data likelihood; but the same principle applies here. The weight of the new evidence stands on its, irrespective of prior opinions about the hypothesis.

What is the weight of the NDE experiences?

What is the weight of the God-water claims?

 

[marplots]

I let it go when you commented in the other thread that the evidential weight of new information should depend on context, that is, what we already know. That's actually wrong. What we already know goes into the prior probability. The evidential weight of any new information updates our prior probability. But it is fundamental to Bayesian inference that the weight of the new information is independent of the prior. In other words, two people with different prior odds for a hypothesis, should always be able to agree on the amount that newly received information should affect those odds.

To put it another way, if two people with different prior odds for a hypothesis each obtain the same new information, their odds should change by the same amount. This is automatic in formal Bayesian analysis, where there is a formal mathematical model for the data likelihood; but the same principle applies here. The weight of the new evidence stands on its, irrespective of prior opinions about the hypothesis.

Good explanation of the formalism. I don't think it applies much though. If it did, and we were all good Bayesians, we wouldn't disagree as much as we do.

We should be careful throwing around terms like "new information" as if they were settled outside of the formalism. If I'm telling you a "it happened to me" story, I have a different style of information, a local-to-me version and it is unlikely you will place the same value on it that I do.

The formalism seems to reject the idea of subjective, localized probability in favor of information as a kind of objective currency. There's also the matter of gradations of belief and what happens when someone settles on an hypothesis as confirmed and will investigate no further.

If I saw bigfoot and am convinced I saw bigfoot, on what grounds should I ever add new, disconfirming evidence? And on what basis could I ever transmit my localized experience to someone else? I fail to find Bayes at all useful in such situations.

 

[Jedi]

.
What you are suggesting is exactly akin to saying that we must accept it as positive evidence of supernatural ability when someone says he saw a woman on stage sawn in half and then restored.


It isn't new information; it is simply newly packaged.

Is that what is happening here? Obviously no such agreement has been reached. One reason is that no one can provide any reasonable adjustment to the prior odds.

Let's ask the question a bit more fairly.

Person A and Person B have a Bayesian equation on which they agree with the priors.

Person A finds a book of Grimm's Fairy Tales with which he is previously unfamiliar. "Holy crap!" he says. "I didn't know there were dwarves and witches and magic slippers. This changes the prior odds!"

Person B has known about Grimm's Fairy Tales for years before the Bayesian equation was ever conceived and knows them to be untrue. Regardless how much Person B points out that the GFT are not new evidence Person A insists.

Where is the agreement on that?

We can expand it. Assume it isn't Grimm's Fairy Tales that Person A finds but something else written after the Bayesian equation was crafted so it is, indeed, new. If the new book mentions witches and magic slippers must it be added to the priors? By how much does it increase the prior odds?


What is the weight of the NDE experiences?

What is the weight of the God-water claims?

exactly. the Bayesian framework is fine. but this is all about accepting anecdotal evidence as positive evidence, the question in the original OP. your prior subjective probabilities, based on anecdotes and personal beliefs, are updated with new subjective probabilities (more anecdotes) that prove your point. circular reasoning.

 

[Jabba]

We're not missing each other in any way whatsoever. I have understood all of your claims and answered each in detail multiple times. You have patently ignored everything I've said. Witness this complete reset below. You just restate all the things we've already been over...

LL,
- Thanks for giving me a shot, but I've given it my best, and I haven't convinced you of anything. I think I had best give up...
- However, since six others do seem to agree with my first claim (about anecdotes being evidence), maybe one of the six will be willing to give me a similar shot re my other claims...

 

[Jabba]

Annnnoid, Fudbucker, sphenisc, jt512, caveman 1917, Nick Terry, and Dani,
- (Oops -- 7 rather than 6.)
- Would any of you be willing to tackle my other claims?

 

[Hokulele]

Being reduced to groveling for attention isn't exactly how I imagined a mathematical proof to play out...