There are so many problems here that it’s hard to choose a starting point.
1) the data set you are using is biased (it is selective. all observation is selective)
2) there is no such thing as “raw data”—all your observations are interpreted. your interpretations may be mistaken.
3) what do you mean by “best guess”? one meaning is “most likely to be the final, perfect truth”. but a different meaning is “most useful now”.
4) You say “probabilities represent our state of knowledge”. However there are infinitely many theories with the same probability. Or there would be, except for your solomonoff prior about simpler theories having higher probability. So the important part of “state of our knowledge” as represented by these probabilities consists mostly of the solomonoff prior and nothing else, because it, and it alone, is dealing with the hard problem of epistemology (dealing with theories which make identical predictions about everything we have data for).
5) you can have infinite data and still get all non-emprical issues wrong
6) regarding the conjunction rule, there is miscommunication. this does not address the point i was trying to make. i think you have a premise like “all more complicated theories are merely conjunctions of simpler theories”. But that is to conceive of theories very differently than Popperians do, in what we see as a limited and narrow way. To begin to address these issues, let’s consider what’s better: a bald assertion, or an assertion and an explanation of why it is correct? If you want “most likely to happen to be the perfect, final truth” you are better off with only an unargued assertion (since any argument may be mistaken). But if you want to learn about the world, you are better off not relying on unargued assertions.
There are so many problems here that it’s hard to choose a starting point.
1) the data set you are using is biased (it is selective. all observation is selective)
2) there is no such thing as “raw data”—all your observations are interpreted. your interpretations may be mistaken.
3) what do you mean by “best guess”? one meaning is “most likely to be the final, perfect truth”. but a different meaning is “most useful now”.
4) You say “probabilities represent our state of knowledge”. However there are infinitely many theories with the same probability. Or there would be, except for your solomonoff prior about simpler theories having higher probability. So the important part of “state of our knowledge” as represented by these probabilities consists mostly of the solomonoff prior and nothing else, because it, and it alone, is dealing with the hard problem of epistemology (dealing with theories which make identical predictions about everything we have data for).
5) you can have infinite data and still get all non-emprical issues wrong
6) regarding the conjunction rule, there is miscommunication. this does not address the point i was trying to make. i think you have a premise like “all more complicated theories are merely conjunctions of simpler theories”. But that is to conceive of theories very differently than Popperians do, in what we see as a limited and narrow way. To begin to address these issues, let’s consider what’s better: a bald assertion, or an assertion and an explanation of why it is correct? If you want “most likely to happen to be the perfect, final truth” you are better off with only an unargued assertion (since any argument may be mistaken). But if you want to learn about the world, you are better off not relying on unargued assertions.