On Wednesday, February 5, 2025 at 1:36:55 PM UTC-7 Quentin Anciaux wrote:
Brent, I went through the document you sent, and it outlines the different interpretations of probability: mathematical, physical symmetry, degree of belief, and empirical frequency. But none of these resolve the core issue in a single-history universe—where probability is supposed to describe "possibilities" that, in the end, never had any reality. Your frequentist approach assumes that, given enough trials, outcomes will appear in proportions that match their theoretical probabilities. But in a finite, single-history universe, there is no guarantee that will ever happen. Some events with nonzero probability simply won’t occur—not because of statistical fluctuations, but because history only plays out one way. In that case, were those possibilities ever really possible? If something assigned a probability of 10% never happens in the actual course of the universe, then in what meaningful way was it ever a possibility? You argue that if all possibilities are realized, probability loses its meaning. But in a single-history world, probability is just as meaningless because it describes outcomes that never had a chance of being real. If probability is supposed to quantify potential realities, then in a framework where only one reality exists, probability is nothing more than a retrospective justification—it has no actual explanatory power. The math remains internally consistent, but it becomes an empty formalism, detached from anything real. The whole structure relies on pretending that unrealized events still "exist" in some abstract sense, even though they never affect reality. That’s the contradiction at the heart of the single-history view. It uses probability to describe possibilities while simultaneously denying that those possibilities ever had a chance to be real. Why do you assume that some non-zero probabilities never occur? How could you know this? Meanwhile, you prefer a theory, MIi, that can't be verified. Puzzling preferences. AG Le mer. 5 févr. 2025, 20:18, Brent Meeker <[email protected]> a écrit : On 2/5/2025 2:54 AM, Quentin Anciaux wrote: Bruce, That still doesn't address the core issue. If the universe has a unique history and a finite existence, then there is a fundamental limit to the number of repetitions that can ever occur. There is no guarantee that all possible outcomes will ever be realized, no matter how large N is. Some events with nonzero probability simply will never happen. That alone is enough to undermine frequentism in a single-history framework—it relies on the assumption that probabilities reflect long-run frequencies, but if the history is finite and unique, the necessary "long run" does not exist. I recommend that you never play cards for money. Even in an infinite universe, if history is still unique, there is no mechanism ensuring that all outcomes occur in proportions that match their theoretical probabilities. Yet they do match. QM is the most accurate, predictive theory there is. Some possibilities with nonzero probability may remain unrealized forever, making their assigned probabilities meaningless in any real sense. They were never actual possibilities in the first place—just theoretical artifacts with no impact on reality. Your argument assumes that probabilities describe reality in the single-world framework, but without an ensemble where all possibilities exist in some way, this assumption collapses. Where they all exist the probabilities (according to you) become 1, and "probability" is meaningless. I think you are just confused because you don't distinguish between the theory of probability and it's several different applications. You seem to think the world has to be only one certain way for it to apply. Try reading the attached. Brent Probabilities become detached from what actually happens and instead become abstract formalism with no grounding in the real world. That’s the problem: the single-world view wants to use probability theory as if all possibilities have meaning while simultaneously denying that they do. In contrast, in a framework where all possibilities are realized in different branches, probability retains its explanatory power. It describes actual distributions of outcomes rather than pretending that unrealized events still somehow "exist" in a purely mathematical sense. If the universe is unique, and history is unique, then probability has no true foundation—it’s just a game with numbers, untethered from what actually happens. Quentin -- 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]. 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