RE: group based judgment

From: Lee Corbin (lcorbin@tsoft.com)
Date: Fri Jul 26 2002 - 22:26:07 MDT


Hi Amara,

I tend to be as gullible as you, though I'm slowly wising
up. To less credulous readers than you or me, there were
probably many clues, but only one caused me to start to
doubt the whole story: it was when

> As the crowd roared, the guard cried, "I'm sorry,
> I'm sorry! Uncle! I won't do it again!"

People don't do that. :-D

On a more serious note, you write

> Lee Corbin [wrote]
>
> >A principle of Pan Critical Rationalism is that all knowledge is
> >conjectural; when applied to the particular case of an airport security
> >guard, this means that he or she can never be certain that person X is
> >not a terrorist. All he or she can do is to lower the probability to a
> >level corresponding to standards conforming to his or her training, and
> >to the standards of the organization.
>
> Popper vs. Bayesian statistics
> http://forum.javien.com/XMLmessage.php?id=id::K2xQZQh6-KixO-aGgi-bwMG-OxAfHH5IdmZs

I find that's an interesting essay by Messrs. Howson and Urbach,
especially the obvious fact (after it's pointed out!) that
extremely unlikely things have to happen all the time. And
that's accounted for, of course, by the presence of
fantastically large numbers of trials.

Though relevant, were you making a point or offering any criticism
by means of posting that, that you would care to explain?

Thanks,
Lee

> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-extropians@extropy.org
> [mailto:owner-extropians@extropy.org]On Behalf Of Amara Graps
> Sent: Friday, July 26, 2002 5:01 PM
> To: extropians@extropy.org
> Subject: RE: group based judgment
>
>
> Hi Hal,
>
> >Maybe that was obvious to some readers, but I'll bet
> >other people were fooled like I was, at least for a while.
>
> Huh! Once again, the gullible girl.
>
> I was fooled. I was in between alot of plane trips when
> I received that story from an extropian a few months ago (initials:
> T.E.). I didn't look carefully at the names in the story.
>
> It's a great story, though, dont'cha think ?
> My parents got a good laugh out of it too (that must be
> where I learned my gullibleness)
>
> I should tell my own airport security stories next time! :-)
>
> (hint: women, don't wear underwire bras through the metal detectors)
>
> Amara



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