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[Merged] Immortality & Bayesian Statistics

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Giordano said:
Jabba, there are no good answers for you to formulate and present! The very beginning of your proof is in error. This has been explained to you in multiple ways, but almost all of them focus on one point: the probability of an event that has already occurred is 1. If you start a mathematic proof with 1=1+1, there is no way to justify the rest of the proof. That is what you are doing here.
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Giordano,
- This has not been explained many times -- it's been claimed many times.
- We're not questioning the probability that I exist; we're questioning the probability that I exist by chance -- given the scientific hypothesis that I can exist only one, short life in all of "eternity," at most.
--- Jabba
 
I have a proof that I am immortal based on my knowledge of mathematical induction. My proof is superior to Jabba's proof. I will outline my proof in a future post.
 
Jabba said:
Giordano,
- This has not been explained many times -- it's been claimed many times.
- We're not questioning the probability that I exist; we're questioning the probability that I exist by chance -- given the scientific hypothesis that I can exist only one, short life in all of "eternity," at most.
--- Jabba
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So no immortality. Thread over?
 
Jabba said:
We're not questioning the probability that I exist; we're questioning the probability that I exist by chance Jabba
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Isn't your proof in fact a proof of deteminism then, rather than immortality? Or are you claiming determinism => immortality?
 
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Jabba said:
- We're not questioning the probability that I exist; we're questioning the probability that I exist by chance -- given the scientific hypothesis that I can exist only one, short life in all of "eternity," at most.
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The probability is 1. You do exist. So, by definition, you probably exist.
 
Jabba said:
Giordano,
- This has not been explained many times -- it's been claimed many times.
- We're not questioning the probability that I exist; we're questioning the probability that I exist by chance -- given the scientific hypothesis that I can exist only one, short life in all of "eternity," at most.
--- Jabba
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Thanks for proving that you have no understanding of statistics, even if you have used statistics at times in you life. What people have explained to you isn't a claim- its an inherent aspect of how statistics works.

Fundamentally you are starting with the presumption that you are special, much more special than all the other gene combinations that could have arisen from the past million years of matings. Then you are going to use statistics to show how unlikely your one combination would be. Which you will use to show how special you are.

Do you see a flaw in that?
 
Given that I am alive and in good health right now (at time t=t0), the odds that I will be alive and in good health at some point in the future (at time t=t1) can approach as close to 1 as we like for any choice of t1 s.t. t1-t0 < e for some 'e'. If I am alive at some point in time, I can therefore guarantee that I will be alive at some subsequent time. My birth certificate confirms that at some point I was alive. Therefore I am immortal.
 
Jabba said:
- This has not been explained many times -- it's been claimed many times.
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No claims are being made, the analogies are just to help you spot the flaw in your own reasoning.

Your reasoning is a well known fallacy; you're far from the first to make this particular mistake and I'm sure you won't be the last.
 
Jabba said:
Giordano,
- This has not been explained many times -- it's been claimed many times.
- We're not questioning the probability that I exist; we're questioning the probability that I exist by chance -- given the scientific hypothesis that I can exist only one, short life in all of "eternity," at most.
--- Jabba
Click to expand...

No, you really aren't doing that. You've plucked numbers out of the air and used them to calculate the probability that a particular combination of genes will exist at some point perhaps 10,000 years in the future, and use this tiny number to claim that you are special - the hand of aces. You also fail to understand that aces are just ink on card, only valued more than any other card because humans ascribe value to them when playing some games.

You haven't even attempted to justify the numbers you have used, nor explained what this calculation is supposed to show about 'chance', existence or immortality.

You are not any more or less special than any of the >7 billion people alive today, or any of the >108 billion who have ever lived on this planet.

Could you answer the five simple questions I posed on the previous page?
 
MRC_Hans said:
Listen, Jabba:

Calculate the probablility of a given sequence of 100 dice rolls.

(It is something to the tune of 1/6E100)

Now take a dice and roll it 100 times, noting each result (should not take you more than half an hour).

The sequence you got was, a priori, improbable against astronomic odds, still, there it is.



Explain it for the dice throws.

Hans
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Yes, but does this not prove then, that dice are immortal?
 
Hello, is this thing on? / obfuscation / long division

Hello? Jabba? I "nominate" Agatha to speak for "our side" in this debate. 5 simple questions. Go.

Agatha said:
1) Where did you get your numbers from?

2) Do you agree with Humots that your maths shows the probability of the non-religious hypothesis to be much more likely than the religious hypothesis?

3) Do you understand that you are calculating the probability of 'you' existing in 2012 as if you were performing the calculation 20,000 years ago?

4) Do you understand why this is a foolish thing to do, given that we are in 2012 and all the things that had to happen to produce you (or any of the 7 billion people in the world) have already happened?

5) Do you understand what people are getting at when they give you analogies such as a puddle thinking the hole is made for it, or the wine thinking the glass is made for it?

It takes one post to answer those five questions. It takes one post to lay out the rest of the argument (again, you should have put your entire argument into your first post). One post. In the words of Nike, just do it.
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Try again.

Suppose a worldwide lottery is established. One ticket per individual, man, woman and child.

7 billion tickets are issued to the entire population of Earth.

What are the odds of you, Jabba, holding the winning ticket?
7 billion to one, obviously.

What are the odds of somebody holding the winning ticket? One.

You are claiming that given the 7 billion to one odds of you being the winner somehow confers a specialness upon you, even though you are not the winner.
 
abaddon said:
Try again.

Suppose a worldwide lottery is established. One ticket per individual, man, woman and child.

7 billion tickets are issued to the entire population of Earth.

What are the odds of you, Jabba, holding the winning ticket?
7 billion to one, obviously.

What are the odds of somebody holding the winning ticket? One.

You are claiming that given the 7 billion to one odds of you being the winner somehow confers a specialness upon you, even though you are not the winner.
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This has been explained to Jabba numerous times, in numerous ways. He has yet to address it, let alone demonstrate he understands the concept.

How about Agatha's five questions, Jabba? Can you answer those?
 
jt512 said:
Jaynes considered the background information fundamental to probabilistic reasoning, but since it appears in every term in Bayes' Theorem, the equation is correct with or without it; so, unless your argument requires that you stress the importance of the background information, you can write Bayes' Theorem without it.

Jay
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Jay,
- Is it incorrect to call the "k" implicit in the various probabilities given?
--- Jabba
 
zooterkin said:
How about you stop messing around and tell us what the thread's actually about?

Where does immortality come in?
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Zoo,

- My basic effort here is to evaluate the scientific hypothesis that -- at most -- we each have but one short life to live.
- My basic claim is that my own existence right now is relevant to that evaluation -- strongly weighing against that hypothesis, and therefore suggesting "something like" immortality.
- I gave four possible alternative hypotheses (suggestions) along those lines: 1)I am a basic and eternal part of reality; 2) reincarnation; 3) "now" isn't what we think it is; and, 4) We aren't nearly as smart as we think we are (I just added the "nearly"). And, there might be more.
- You guys raise at least two objections: 1) since I already exist, the probability of my existence is 1.00 -- which consequently, blows my conclusion out of the water; and 2) every specific event is highly improbable (in the sense that I mean it), but they happen anyway…

- Do you agree with my description so far?

--- Jabba
 
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