On Fri, Jan 10, 2025 at 5:43 PM Quentin Anciaux <[email protected]> wrote:
> Le ven. 10 janv. 2025, 07:31, Bruce Kellett <[email protected]> a > écrit : > >> When you roll a die, the probability of a four is 1/6. Do the other >> possibilities have to exist? Even if they do, they have no influence on the >> outcome you actually observe. Probabilities are useful for predicting >> possible outcomes; so I can, in advance, predict that the possibility that >> I shall get a four is 1/6. That is all there is to it. That is what >> probabilities do. There is no need for the other possible outcomes to >> exist, either in advance or after the fact. They play no role, outside of >> your imagination. >> >> Bruce >> > > The difference with your die example is that in a single-history > framework, the probabilities we assign are only meaningful if the ensemble > of possible outcomes has some kind of reality. When you roll a die, the > probability of a four being 1/6 relies on the existence of a mechanism > where all six sides are genuinely possible outcomes before the roll. If we > later observe that, in the single history of the universe, a four never > occurs, then its actual probability was not 1/6—it was zero. (It’s an > example) > > In a single-world view, the other possibilities never had any reality at > all—they were not actualized, not even hypothetically. So, the act of > assigning probabilities becomes a purely formal exercise, disconnected from > what can or cannot happen. The other sides of the die are reduced to > abstractions, with no causal role in the observed outcome. > > Probabilities are indeed tools for predicting outcomes, but their > usefulness depends on the assumption that the possibilities they describe > have some grounding in reality. Without that grounding, they become empty > numbers. In frameworks like many-worlds, those possibilities exist as > actualized outcomes in other branches, giving substance to the > probabilities. But in a single-history framework, the unobserved > possibilities never existed, making the probabilities feel like a game of > imagination rather than a reflection of the world. > > If the "other possible outcomes" have no reality, even as hypothetical > constructs, then the act of predicting probabilities loses its explanatory > value. They become detached from the reality they aim to describe. That’s > the fundamental issue I’m pointing to. Without some ontological weight for > the ensemble of possibilities, probabilities are just formal tools with no > connection to what actually happens. > That is just patent nonsense. Formal tools are quite capable of giving the right answer for the realized world; (and the right answer is what actually happens.) Bruce -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/CAFxXSLSk-3qcCW_-0eNAxk5GhK8TLr5DZpYtM%3D_sEMZAEvVd-A%40mail.gmail.com.
