RE: FIN Again (was: Re: James Higgo)

From: Charles Goodwin <cgoodwin.domain.name.hidden>
Date: Fri, 31 Aug 2001 10:16:55 +1200

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Jacques Mallah [mailto:jackmallah.domain.name.hidden]
>
> >self-sampling assumption--what does it mean to say that "I" should reason
> >as if I had an equal probability of being any one of all possible observer-moments?
>
> It means - and I admit it does take a little thought here - _I want to
> follow a guessing procedure that, in general, maximizes the fraction of
> those people (who use that procedure) who get the right guess_. (Why would
> I want a more error-prone method?) So I use Bayesian reasoning with the
> best prior available, the uniform one on observer-moments, which maximizes
> the fraction of observer-moments who guess right. No soul-hopping in that
> reasoning, I assure you.

I'm sorry, I still don't see how that applies to me. If I know which observer moments I'm in (e.g. I know how old I am) why should I
reason as though I don't?

Charles
Received on Thu Aug 30 2001 - 15:14:38 PDT