Meetup : Vancouver Extraordinary Evidence and Bayes
Discussion article for the meetup : Vancouver Extraordinary Evidence and Bayes
I recently saw someone claim that “extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence” was a terrible hueristic. Then I saw someone use it to possibly get the wrong answer on something. Then my friends here at the meetup claimed they weren’t comfortable with the whole bayes thing. So maybe it’s time we had a chat about this, and practical bayesian epistemology in general.
Of course the conversation will wander after that, and we will adventure through all sorts of wonderful topics.
I’m switching up the venue a bit; this time we will meet at 2150 macdonald st (a big brown house at 6th and macdonald). Still the usual 15:00 start-time.
Please join us on the mailing list.
(Haven’t seen many lurkers in a while, lurkers please come out.)
“Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence” isn’t a good heuristic if you expect that your brain isn’t good at figuring out what things are extraordinary. Bayes isn’t a good framework if you expect that your brain isn’t good at updating correctly. In general, if you aren’t very smart, don’t have unusual goals, and the people around you aren’t crazy, you might be better off doing what comes naturally.