Cont: Proof of Immortality VIII

Jabba said:
Mojo,
- What do you think is the likelihood of the current existence of your body --given OOFLam?
How would you determine that?
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Jabba, you are insufferably rude. The futility of that question has been explained to you at length, as well as the distractive effect of constantly asking your critics to validate your method by filling in the blanks themselves. The question at hand is not how Mojo or anyone else would go about formulating your proof. The question is how you plan to deal with the clear errors you have made in formulating it.

You claim to have determined the likelihood of your current existence. You claim, given materialism, that it's 10-100. Yet you will not explain how you calculated that number. Asking other people to do it doesn't get you off the hook.
 
Jabba said:
- Yes.
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And the rudeness continues unabated. This is now the third time you have responded simply "yes" to the direct question of how you computed 10-100. Please at least attempt to make some sort of cogent excuse for why you have rebuffed so many direct questions.
 
Jabba said:
Mojo,
- The brain is a given in both H and ~H. I equated that to P(E) = 1 in both cases, trying to explain why the conjunction fallacy did not apply to our situation -- multiplying a probability by 1 doesn't make it smaller.
- I'm not sure that P(E) = 1 is appropriate terminology, and seems like I just created more confusion by using it... - 10-100 expresses how likely you are to currently exist if you have only one finite life to live at most -- and, you don't have to ever exist...
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jt512 said:
Actually, you created more certainty, since it is now obvious that your argument is mathematically inconsistent.
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jt,
- How is that?
 
Jabba said:
- Yes.
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Correct. It makes no difference what number you wish to assign to P(B) because that number is the same under H or ~H. Therefore, your current existence under ~H cannot be more likely than under H. At best, they could be equal, but since your made up numbers are that the likelihood of your soul existing is less than one, you have just proved that H is more likely.
 
Jabba said:
js,
- Bayes (basic?) Theorem does not involve any hypotheses. It involves only events. Your formula hilited above should be P(A|B) = P(A|B)(P(B) / P(A).
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Bayes is mostly neutral on hypotheses versus events. My presentation of Bayes Theorem was correct. (Yours, however, has a typographic error in the first term.)

P(H|E) = P(E|H)(P(H) / (P(E|H)P(H) + P(E|~H)P(~H)) is the theorem as it applies to complementary hypotheses.
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No, that's not the theorem. That can, however, be derived from the theorem via a trivial bit of algebra, but the theorem is as I stated it.

Be that as it may, since you have conceded that P(E) = 1, it is then a mathematical certainty that P(E|H) must also = 1. You don't get to say, "Well, yes, P(E) = 1, but I'm using different math for P(E|H)."

P(E) = 1 means E is a certainty always, under any and all hypotheses, including H, and so P(E|H) = 1.
 
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Jabba said:
Mojo,
- I'm not sure that P(E) = 1 is appropriate terminology, and seems like I just created more confusion by using it...
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jt512 said:
Actually, you created more certainty, since it is now obvious that your argument is mathematically inconsistent.
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Jabba said:
jt,
- How is that?
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Between jsfisher and I, we have explained it to you, like, 4 times in the last day or so. Here is jsfisher's lastest exposition:

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=12215252#post12215252
 
Jabba, as a short aside, I'm wondering how minds like yours function ...

When people keep asking you this question:

Belz... said:
How did you calculate 10-100?
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How do you justify to yourself that you can keep ignoring it?

I'm genuinely curious.

Hans
 
MRC_Hans said:
I think were on to something basic here.

Do you mean that while your self is perceived through your current brain, it could be perceived through any brain, and thus whichever physical appearance you might be in, you would somehow be YOU?

In that case I think we are at a more basic caveat:

Just because one hypothesis has a higher likelihood than another it needs not be the true one.

An example: I give you a nice, fresh ripe apple. I inform you that it comes from a tree in my garden.

Now, we can make two hypoteses:

H : Apples grow seasonally on the three and it carries fresh ripe apples for a period of about five weeks every year.

~H : Apples do not grow seasonally but are available any time of the year.

The likelihood of getting a ripe apple under H is about 1/10.
Under ~H it is 1.

However, apples still grow seasonally on my tree.

Hans
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Jabba said:
Hans,

- I think that you left out a couple of important words.
- H : Apples grow seasonally on my tree and it carries fresh ripe apples for a period of about five weeks every year.
- ~H : Apples do not grow seasonally on my tree but are available any time of the year.
- The likelihood of getting a ripe apple from my tree under H is about 1/10. Under ~H it is 1.
- I got a fresh apple from my tree. - The likelihood of getting a fresh apple from my tree is greater Under ~H than under H -- but the prior probability of H is much greater than the prior probability of ~H.
- I don't know much about the prior probabilities here, but my best guess is that the Bayes formula would include the following numbers:
- P(H|E) = .10*1/((.10*1) + (1*.01)) or .10/.11 or 91%.
- In other words, the posterior probability that your tree is seasonal is 91%.
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MRC_Hans said:
It doesn't matter who owns the tree. Just as it doesn't matter which self we are discussing here.

In my example, we can indeed infer that the tree is likely to be seasonal, because most apple trees are. None of us know exactly how likely, so putting in numbers in a formula is silly (and a bad habit from your side), but you are, from what data you do have, obviously mistaken: I'm in Denmark and the month is march. If I have apples on a tree, it is most certainly not seasonal!

The point in this is that the most likely event needs not be true. Unless you have extensive data to work from, you cannot generate mathematical evidence for anything, and actually disproving something is virtually impossible.

Hans
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Hans,
- I think you're agreeing with me. Likelihood is just two pieces of the Posterior Probability pie.
 
jond said:
Then you must understand that your likelihood under ~H (where you add a soul) is much less than under H (where the only thing you have is your brain).
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- No. We're accepting, in ~H, that the brain currently exists -- and consequently, we don't need to multiply the prior probability of there being something spiritual here by the likelihood of there being a brain here.
 
Jabba said:
- No. We're accepting, in ~H, that the brain currently exists -- and consequently, we don't need to multiply the prior probability of there being something spiritual here by the likelihood of there being a brain here.
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Jabba, I think you're agreeing with everyone that the likelihood of H is 1 and is therefore virtually infinitely more likely than ~H.

How did you calculate your strawman to be 10 -100?
 
Jabba said:
I think you're agreeing with me.
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What on Earth gave you that idea?

Likelihood is just two pieces of the Posterior Probability pie.
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But you aren't dealing in likelihoods You're dealing in probabilities. If you were dealing in likelihoods you wouldn't have to mess around with the complement of H and the resulting false dilemma.

MRC_Hans is simply reiterating what I told you months ago, as part of that fatal flaw lists. You don't understand the relationship between probability and probation. That list isn't going to go away just because you have decided you can't cope with it.
 
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