Bayes Theorem & Joseph Smith's Seer Stone

[Aristotle Smith]

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[Philo Sofee]

A very interesting view Aristotle! Thank you for expressing it. In this case (and I am actually in the middle of this with a family right now, more or less actually!) I would then begin asking why the believe and what makes them believe and ask them how much they do so and what it is that makes them give so much credence to that belief and compare why I don't have that much belief and how much why I don't have that belief and work out the probabilities of my skepticism, which is precisely what Bayes helps or at least is supposed to help us do. We can use Bayes with our epistimic beliefs also. Something is persuading us to believe, so what is that something and does it have evidence? That's the approach I am at.

True, it won't be extraordinary evidence, perhaps, but the answer "because" doesn't cut it either, there has to be more to it.

Do I believe in UFO's? No. It would be fantastically interesting, however, if they were real!
Do I believe in ESP? No.
And so on...... Perhaps it is more the accumulation of many evidences that needs to be extraordinary in order to persuade... I shall have to think this through.

On your resurrection theme, yes pointing to a book is rather ordinary from a human view, but I would then proceed to the actual physical evidence of bodies and the track record on that for assessment, since that is one interpretation. How many bodies have we evidenced being actually resurrected? And go from there. If the idea is that it is spiritual instead of physical, I would begin with the evidences of that based on actual occurrences we have records of, and go from there. There has to be something else persuading someone to believe, and I suspect we could get to that eventually through examining all our assumptions based on how the world works, and then discuss possible analogies to help explain why I don't believe as they do. My epistimic probability is what they would have to change with evidence just like it is with mundane things in the world. I could ask them what probability would they give if I actually claimed I could do 500 pushups nonstop right in front of them right now? And work that up into the supernatural stuff. What would make it extraordinary is because there are so very, very few people who can normally just drop down and do 500 pushups. Hence initial skepticism is entirely normal, until I prove the claim. I could flex my muscles, but that is ordinary evidence and unpersuasive. By doing the pushups is extraordinary. I have actually approached it this way and it's fairly effective to at least get them to recognize why I am skeptical of some kinds of claims. And that is what probability helps us out for seeing. Just HOW skeptical should we be of wild claims?

Perhaps I really am naïve, but someone believes something *BECAUSE* there actually is a reason, and that reason can be discussed in Bayesian terms if they are open to it, either directly or through analogy. I can compare their belief in something with something else they can't possibly believe and help them see that, perhaps. I would begin with mundane things and move onto more difficult things. Perhaps a ball falling to the ground to help them establish reality and go from there.

[Philo Sofee]

Aristotle Smith
We have both, and the rather ordinary evidence shows that it was not translated from papyrus. Similar proofs would exist for the Book of Mormon. In fact, I think it does harm to the critic's case to assert that extraordinary evidence is needed. This then gives the apologist the ability to say the critic is making unreasonable demands, by demanding the extraordinary. The critic is actually demanding rather ordinary evidence, which the apologist cannot supply.

If it is unreasonable to ask them to demonstrate with extraordinary evidence for the Book of Mormon, then that's their problem. If they actually are interested in me believing it, they have to satisfy MY epistimic probability, not THEIRS. I wouldn't care the hell less if they squealed that. Nothing about the coming forth of the Book of Mormon is just the everyday way books are produced. Yes I am in fact seriously insistent that they produce some very GOOD evidence (which will, by definition simply HAVE to be extraordinary) before I budge from my skepticism. They can imagine all they want that is being too fussy. Oh well. I can then walk my way. I would not in the least be concerned about it. I think the point is that we can change the wording and still see the need is valid.

I can take a single leap without any physical assistance from any physical gadget and fly up onto the top of a 5 story apartment complex rather easily, and land safely to boot. With that claim, the evidence which would only be able to persuade the skepticism would simply be the extraordinary evidence of me actually performing that feat! Any ad hoc excuse I give when it dawns on someone it can't be done would never be sufficient. Any secondary testimonial from anyone else that they saw me do it would be insufficient to anyone else. There would be, based upon what we know about how things work, nothing ordinary about having to demonstrate its truth. I suspect that is more in line with what is meant... especially with claimed physical events in the world.

Bayes would help us see how justified both and either our skepticism or our beliefs would be in claims being made. And how much belief or how much skepticism would be reasonable. That's it's beauty.

[Philo Sofee]

Mr Stak
Philo’s use of Sagan is appropriate because it drives home the idea that evidence is something that is dynamic in nature. It simply isn’t the issue of there being evidence present in favor of something, that evidence also needs a certain characteristic or quality that justifies its assigned value.

There. Right there. Thank you for this. This is KEY entirely. And it is where discussion can honestly begin with all kinds of claims in all kinds of subjects which we are discovering through the previous decades now that Bayes is broadening out into so many various disciplines, and correctly so. Especially in history, amazing enough!

When the patent office finally told the world no more patents would be given on perpetual motion machines until the machine is brought in and demonstrated it solved the problem of hundreds of patents a year coming in to them. Diagrams and pictures and explanations were all thought to be good enough evidence. They weren't, and no more patents have been filed since.

The grand old man of probability and statistics E. T. Jaynes (Probability Theory: The Logic of Science, pp. 119-126) described how and why he would not believe in ESP even if it was directly shown to him and it actually had occurred on the occasion and he could not deny that it occurred. Is this him simply being stupidly hard headed though? Not at all. What must happen, as he clearly and beautifully illustrates with Bayes Theorem, is that the track record, the known track record of the umpteen thousands of previous lyings, cheatings, and failures of ESP must be overcome , not on a singular occasion, which justifiably could be by chance - it IS within the probabilities of chance 1 time in 1,000 - before our very proper skepticism can be overcome. As Jaynes says, there are so many other hypotheses which can account for the event that ALL of those have to be addressed and shown improbable! No one who claims ESP apparently understands this, but it is perfectly sane and reasonable to expect that to happen before belief can occur. Here, instead of physical probability as in the perpetual motion machine example, we are dealing with epistimic probability. Just why should we believe, and more importantly when do we begin to assent to belief? With one piece of evidence? Will two do? ten? fifty? Is it a matter of quantity or quality? Or both?

The track record itself for evidences for the Book of Mormon and Book of Abraham is part of our background, and is certainly involved with probability for belief! This is something apologists apparently do not quite yet get. For every failure they have had in their herculean efforts to demonstrate authenticity, a single success cannot overcome that failure. Because a single success, because of the large amount of previous failures, now has a very small probability to overturn dozens of failures! Not only must a track record now be obtained in favor of those scriptures, but the evidences now must be toward the extraordinary end of the meter instead of just yet another piece of evidence. The evidences now have to be stellar, not just another quantity. Now quality is all that can do it, and it is something not available, at least not yet that we have seen. And I mean quality to the tune now that Zarahemla really MUST be found, and....and in order for its probability to be very good, must be agreed upon my the majority of scholars that yes, indeed, this site is very much the actual Book of Mormon city. I mean scholars on the caliber of Michael D. Coe, not a BYU scholar with an agenda. This is what is needed and what is not available. Punting to faith does not make the probability go up, it weakens it, since that is an ad hoc step taken when the evidence is not good enough.

[malkie]

Extraordinary Claims Require Extraordinary Evidence

I hear this all the time. I know what people are trying to say, but I don't think it's right.

Take a simple claim: I won the Texas State Powerball. That's quite an extraordinary (and unfortunately for me, false) claim. What is the required evidence that I won? Simple, a ticket with numbers on it and a proof of purchase. What's the required evidence that I lost? Same thing, a ticket with numbers on it and a proof of purchase.

You might claim that the difference is one is winning and the other is losing. But that doesn't work. The difference is merely the numbers on the ticket. There is nothing else different about the tickets. In fact it's easy to prove they aren't different. Suppose the tickets stay the same, but the Powerball numbers change in such a way that the losing ticket is now the winner and the winner is now the loser. Literally nothing different about the tickets. In other words, the evidence for this rather extraordinary event is rather mundane.
...

Of course, that would be valid evidence of your losing only if the ticket were uniquely pre-specified in some way, or if we could prove (or take your word for it) that you bought only one ticket for the specific draw we are talking about.

For all we know, you actually won the Powerball, but are trying to conceal the facts by having bought two tickets, and expecting us to believe that your showing us a losing ticket excludes the possibility that you also have a winning ticket.

Can we really believe that you didn't win?

Or do you just not want to share your winnings with your good friends at discussmormonism?

[Philo Sofee]

I hear this all the time. I know what people are trying to say, but I don't think it's right.

Take a simple claim: I won the Texas State Powerball. That's quite an extraordinary (and unfortunately for me, false) claim. What is the required evidence that I won? Simple, a ticket with numbers on it and a proof of purchase. What's the required evidence that I lost? Same thing, a ticket with numbers on it and a proof of purchase.

You might claim that the difference is one is winning and the other is losing. But that doesn't work. The difference is merely the numbers on the ticket. There is nothing else different about the tickets. In fact it's easy to prove they aren't different. Suppose the tickets stay the same, but the Powerball numbers change in such a way that the losing ticket is now the winner and the winner is now the loser. Literally nothing different about the tickets. In other words, the evidence for this rather extraordinary event is rather mundane.
...

Of course, that would be valid evidence of your losing only if the ticket were uniquely pre-specified in some way, or if we could prove (or take your word for it) that you bought only one ticket for the specific draw we are talking about.

For all we know, you actually won the Powerball, but are trying to conceal the facts by having bought two tickets, and expecting us to believe that your showing us a losing ticket excludes the possibility that you also have a winning ticket.

Can we really believe that you didn't win?

Or do you just not want to share your winnings with your good friends at discussmormonism?

Skeptic.

[malkie]

Of course, that would be valid evidence of your losing only if the ticket were uniquely pre-specified in some way, or if we could prove (or take your word for it) that you bought only one ticket for the specific draw we are talking about.

For all we know, you actually won the Powerball, but are trying to conceal the facts by having bought two tickets, and expecting us to believe that your showing us a losing ticket excludes the possibility that you also have a winning ticket.

Can we really believe that you didn't win?

Or do you just not want to share your winnings with your good friends at discussmormonism?

Skeptic.

Am I really being a skeptic? (as if you, of all people, would think that's a bad thing?)

Or am I just looking out for you as well as the rest of us?

[Philo Sofee]

Skeptic.

Am I really being a skeptic? (as if you, of all people, would think that's a bad thing?)

Or am I just looking out for you as well as the rest of us?

Well in that case darling dear one, I shall post haste say you Sweetheart.

[huckelberry]

I think that the phrase extraordinary evidence is so vague that I think it consists of rhetorical hot air. Aristotle Smith explained quite well I thought. You want evidence that is relevant to the question. Do we have visitors from another planet? People seeing UFO simply does not touch the question. Tracking space ships leaving Mars and coming to earth would be relevant evidence.

[Philo Sofee]

I think that the phrase extraordinary evidence is so vague that I think it consists of rhetorical hot air. Aristotle Smith explained quite well I thought. You want evidence that is relevant to the question. Do we have visitors from another planet? People seeing UFO simply does not touch the question. Tracking space ships leaving Mars and coming to earth would be relevant evidence.

Good points as well. I agree, Aristotle has some great points. Evidence relevant to the question is necessary, of course, also. But if it is to match the claim, and since some claims really are out of the normal from what we expect, then evidence has to be out of the normal also otherwise it does not overcome the out of the normal, right? Like Jaynes so beautifully demonstrated with ESP. It's not going to be extraordinary per se if one claim of ESP works. The extraordinary part is going to be no more faking it like they have for centuries, and build a track record of actual ESP accomplishment for the next upcoming centuries to overcome the prior and background weakness their track record has given us. Now THAT would be extraordinary! But this is a must do if any credence will ever be given to the phenomena...notice, it doesn't have to be supernatural, just extraordinary.