Why Malerin is Wrong About Bayes Theorem

[RandFan]

Some kind of distribution, certainly. An even distribution, no, it's impossible per the link. Unless you use improper priors, which may be fine.

There are not more false statements than true statements, since every statement has its negation. There may be more nonexistent describable things than existent describable things, but that doesn't mean the priors on them should be flat. As a very simple example, it's more likely that there is a one eyed people eater in your basement than a one eyed purple people eater. I think it's not clear at all how to actually divvy up possibility space.

Of course, this has arbitrarily close to nothing to do with the OP.

Thanks for your patience. I've been trying to find support for my position and the closest I've come is the following by Charles K. MacKay.

(Infinitely...) many more existential statements ("There is at least one...")are false than true. Hence, the claim with the lower probability is the one that needs to be proved.

Conceded that it is simply an appeal to authority but I'm wondering if the problem isn't simply in my syntax. I'm not certain.

 

[Malerin]

But we do have plenty of other information. We know that "God" is not a necessary explanation for anything. We know that the term has been defined in contradictory ways and usually in ways that are internally self-contradictory. We know that most of the characteristics that have historically been attributed to "God" have been found to be naturalistic.

We know that most theists define God as someone who intervenes in all sorts of things, who listens and answers prayers, who reveals future events through prophets, etc. Many theists say their belief in God is based on ancient writings which are known to have errors, inconsistencies, contradictions and downright falsehoods.

Seems like willful ignorance to ignore all that and say that the agnostic value for the probability of God's existence is 0.5.

It would be like playing 3 card monte with a known cheat. You've caught him lying over and over again, yet THIS time you say that the chances of a certain card being the Queen is 1:3.

No, my point was that .5 is the agnostic value. Some people resisted that quite a bit.

In the FT argument, I gave .1 to the hypothesis that a universe creator exists.

 

[Ivor the Engineer]

<snip>

It would be like playing 3 card monte with a known cheat. You've caught him lying over and over again, yet THIS time you say that the chances of a certain card being the Queen is 1:3.

I think that's a pretty good analogy for debating God's existence with a theist. I.e. once the posterior probability for a theist's particular brand of god has plummeted to an embarrassingly low value, the theist will simply change the hypothesis and make you start all over again.

 

[paximperium]

0.5 is not an agnostic-based value. It is an ignorance-based value. You can only use 0.5 as a probability if you know absolutely nothing about the probability of the said claim to be true or false.

An agnostic position would be a refusal or inability to place a value on that probability. While this definition may be used differently in mathematics, Malerin is attempting to insinuate and use it otherwise.

But that isn't even close to Malerin's claim. He started out with his inane "fine-tuning" argument and attempted to weasel in his god via a manipulation of Bayesian Statistics. Now that his entire "fine tuning" argument has been torn to shreds and he has ran away from the other thread because he is not able to support that claim anymore, he is left with arguing this point in order to score some sort of sad victory.

 

[fls]

No, my point was that .5 is the agnostic value. Some people resisted that quite a bit.

That's because it's not 0.5, but a distribution based on 0.5. It depends upon whether it's a binary postition (not a fake binary position, like God exists or doesn't). And none of us are agnostic, unless you are willing to agree that the universe which includes a capricious creative or controlling force is the one without God and the universe that doesn't is the one with God.

Linda

 

[paximperium]

I think that's a pretty good analogy for debating God's existence with a theist. I.e. once the posterior probability for a theist's particular brand of god has plummeted to an embarrassingly low value, the theist will simply change the hypothesis and make you start all over again.

Well that explain the entire Malerin game that he has been playing.

He started with some silly Idealist/Dualistic argument; got his argument epically shredded and then quickly switched gears to a fine tuning argument via statistics.

He has since failed to support his fine tuning argument and is now left with statistical manipulation...apparently god only exist in between number fudging...sad.

I expect him to return with another inane apolegetic argument soon.

 

[Malerin]

That's because it's not 0.5, but a distribution based on 0.5.

No, it's just .5. In the absence of evidence for or against, a logically possible proposition is assigned an agnostic value.

If you knew a snargle can land quarg, you should assign a .5 value to the claim "this snargle will land quarg." Maybe it lands quarg 90% of the time, maybe 1% of the time. You don't know. To assign a value other than .5 would require some type of evidence.

 

[Ichneumonwasp]

No, it's just .5. In the absence of evidence for or against, a logically possible proposition is assigned an agnostic value.

If you knew a snargle can land quarg, you should assign a .5 value to the claim "this snargle will land quarg." Maybe it lands quarg 90% of the time, maybe 1% of the time. You don't know. To assign a value other than .5 would require some type of evidence.

And so, your argument with MM that there is evidence for God but no evidence for the FSM plays into this how?

We have evidence for God but we assign the probability 0.5?

 

[MattusMaximus]

We need to consider ourselves fortunate that there are guys like Dr.Kitten who are willing to even bother with us. And I for one am seriously grateful. I've learned one hell of a lot on this forum.

I agree. I've learned a lot in the last few days reading this thread (as well as others) on these topics. I also want to thank Dr.Kitten as well as the others - fls, Greedy, RD, etc - who've made useful contributions to the discussion. Ichwasp, I especially want to thank you for your wonderful explanation of the use of priors, posteriors, and Bayes Theorem - that post got everything to finally click for me!

And, I suppose in a weird way, I have Malerin to thank for bringing up the topic (in a roundabout way) in the first place. He/she is still dead wrong, but in the process I learned much. Thanks again.

RA-men!!!

 

[paximperium]

No, it's just .5. In the absence of evidence for or against, a logically possible proposition is assigned an agnostic value.

If you knew a snargle can land quarg, you should assign a .5 value to the claim "this snargle will land quarg." Maybe it lands quarg 90% of the time, maybe 1% of the time. You don't know. To assign a value other than .5 would require some type of evidence.

"This snargle will land quarg"="God exists"
"Magic Pixie Unicorn Crossbreeds"="God exists"
"500ft long Worms on Dune"="God exists"

Yeah. I can completely agree with Malerin's premise.

 

[Ivor the Engineer]

<snip>

And none of us are agnostic, unless you are willing to agree that the universe which includes a capricious creative or controlling force is the one without God and the universe that doesn't is the one with God.

Linda

Excellent point.

 

[MattusMaximus]

No, it's just .5. In the absence of evidence for or against, a logically possible proposition is assigned an agnostic value.

If you knew a snargle can land quarg, you should assign a .5 value to the claim "this snargle will land quarg." Maybe it lands quarg 90% of the time, maybe 1% of the time. You don't know. To assign a value other than .5 would require some type of evidence.

So replace "this snargle will land quarg" with "the FSM exists" and you've got it!

Even Dr.Kitten agrees with me on this point

Accept you've lost the argument, Malerin. Or are you going to start weaseling again about how your subjective "evidence" for God trumps all other subjective evidence for the FSM, flying pigs, little pink unicorns, and honest politicians?

 

[paximperium]

Accept you've lost the argument, Malerin. Or are you going to start weaseling again about how your subjective "evidence" for God trumps all other subjective evidence for the FSM, flying pigs, little pink unicorns, and honest politicians?

I had a dream about eating some spaghetti with a cream sauce yesterday therefore the FSM is real.

Ra-men.

 

[MattusMaximus]

Another Pastafarian!

 

[drkitten]

I
So it is safe to say that 0.5 is the proper agnostic estimate but in reality this likely never occurs because even so much as defining a proposition or event to have any useful meaning whatsoever effectively removes that agnosticism?

Yes and no. If you have a particular informed prior in mind, you can get to it in theory using Bayes' theorem starting at the agnostic prior and adding the information that you yourself used to get to that informed prior. For example, several people on this thread have argued that "X exists" is inherently less probable than "X doesn't exist" given the number of ways there are to not exist.

While true, this doesn't tell us (numerically) HOW much less likely "X exists" is. But the same sort of data that you would use to come up with a numeric estimate for how likely "existence" is as an abstract property could also be used as evidence in the Bayesian framework --- and you'd get the same answer.

Assuming, of course, that your informed prior was in fact correct and rationally derived. Since most people are lousy at estimating probability, it's usually more accurate to do it step by step (hence the use of Bayes' theorem).

The other thing that Bayes theorem lets you do is control the amount and type of information you use to reach your conclusion. This can be either good or bad. It can be great, for example, to make sure you reach a decision without prejudice; I can use Bayes' theorem to justify denying a loan to a minority on the basis of publically available information and probabilities that do not include race, and the decision will be legally and morally unassailable.

But I can also use this structure to to keep out information that I know beforehand will be fatal to my argument, which is how Malarin is trying to use it. For example, he assumes (correctly) that the agnostic position on "God exists" is a 50/50 chance, then applies only information that he believes will increase the likelihood that God exists. By telling only one half the story, he can raise the probability as large as you like.

 

[Malerin]

So replace "this snargle will land quarg" with "the FSM exists" and you've got it!

Even Dr.Kitten agrees with me on this point

I doubt it. We know nothing about snargles and quargs, except that a snargle is something can land quarg. The FSM contradicts biological and evolutionary truths, and is a long conjunction of hypotheses which may or may not be true. Per parsimony, in the absence of any evidence, the more bizzarely detailed a creature is, the less likely it's existence. Someone said in this thread that a people-eater is more likely than a purple people-eater, but I don't remember who.

Accept you've lost the argument, Malerin. Or are you going to start weaseling again about how your subjective "evidence" for God trumps all other subjective evidence for the FSM, flying pigs, little pink unicorns, and honest politicians?

Pretty ironic considering the reaction to the OP's claim about how wrong I was. ((Pr(E/H) + Pr(E/~H) = 1) Care to start another thread? Maybe "Why Malerin is wrong part 2"?

But I do appreciate the thanks. We aim to please.

 

[paximperium]

The FSM GOD contradicts biological and evolutionary truths, and is a long conjunction of hypotheses which may or may not be true. Per parsimony, in the absence of any evidence, the more bizzarely detailed a creature is, the less likely it's existence.

Let me seeeeeee....hypocrite anyone?

 

[GreedyAlgorithm]

Care to start another thread? Maybe "Why Malerin is wrong part 2"?

No need for a new thread, drkitten's got us covered. Why Malerin is wrong part 2:

But I can also use this structure to to keep out information that I know beforehand will be fatal to my argument, which is how Malarin is trying to use it. For example, he assumes (correctly) that the agnostic position on "God exists" is a 50/50 chance, then applies only information that he believes will increase the likelihood that God exists. By telling only one half the story, he can raise the probability as large as you like.

 

[MattusMaximus]

I doubt it. We know nothing about snargles and quargs, except that a snargle is something can land quarg. The FSM contradicts biological and evolutionary truths, and is a long conjunction of hypotheses which may or may not be true. Per parsimony, in the absence of any evidence, the more bizzarely detailed a creature is, the less likely it's existence. Someone said in this thread that a people-eater is more likely than a purple people-eater, but I don't remember who.

So your solution is to retreat to an incredibly vague notion of "God" and then claim that you've had specific spiritual experiences with this thing? You also claim that this incredibly vague "God" can somehow influence our universe? But if this "God" is so vague, then how do you have any information that it influences our universe, or is even related to our universe in any manner? You are so talking out of both sides of your mouth here.

It seems that Malerin's "God" is both vague AND specific, depending upon how he/she wants to win the day's argument.

No thanks, I'll stick to my yummy pasta.

Pretty ironic considering the reaction to the OP's claim about how wrong I was. ((Pr(E/H) + Pr(E/~H) = 1) Care to start another thread? Maybe "Why Malerin is wrong part 2"?

But I do appreciate the thanks. We aim to please.

Do you ever admit that you've done anything wrong? Or is all criticism just continually telling you how right you are? Wow, life in your echo chamber must be comfortable

BTW, I'm still waiting for your response in the other thread to Stenger's criticisms of the "fine-tuning" argument - or are you going to run away again?

 

[MattusMaximus]

Let me seeeeeee....hypocrite anyone?

No. You see, it's just that Malerin's subjectivity trumps all other subjectivity, because he/she says so