I have also wondered this. Saying “The sun probably won’t rise tomorrow because it’s risen every day until now” can’t just rest on “my anti-Occam prior has been wrong every day until now, so it’s bound to be right today”. It also has to explain why this particular day is the one where the pattern breaks.
Well, you said the same thing yesterday, and you were right. So you’ll probably be wrong today.
EDIT: I realize this is too flip. But I think you are underestimating how alien the anti-Occamian prior is. Reversed intelligence is like, too stupid to believed. But if being wrong in the past is taken as evidence for being right today, then I could give the same exact “special reason why it’s today” every single day; it’ll be wrong every day, which of course is even more evidence in favor of the reasoning process that generated the wrong idea!
In all seriousness, I’m not sure how an anti-Occamian reasoner would even conclude that its crazy hypotheses were wrong. Because “I saw the sun yesterday because it rose” is surely less complex than “the sun failed to rise yesterday but coincidentally I developed a visual processing disorder/superpower that caused me to see a sun that wasn’t there and also gain the ability to see in the dark as if it was broad daylight.”
I have also wondered this. Saying “The sun probably won’t rise tomorrow because it’s risen every day until now” can’t just rest on “my anti-Occam prior has been wrong every day until now, so it’s bound to be right today”. It also has to explain why this particular day is the one where the pattern breaks.
My brilliant reason why it’s this particular day has been wrong every day until now, so it’s bound to be right today.
This is definitely funny, but I think it’s not merely a prior. It implies non-Bayesian reasoning.
Which is a fine thing to think about, it just dodges the nit that this post is picking.
Your reason for this particular day has never been tested as right or wrong since the morning hasn’t arrived yet.
Also, why should the sun be simply absent tomorrow, rather than purple, or duplicated, or square? None of those has ever happened either.
Well, you said the same thing yesterday, and you were right. So you’ll probably be wrong today.
EDIT: I realize this is too flip. But I think you are underestimating how alien the anti-Occamian prior is. Reversed intelligence is like, too stupid to believed. But if being wrong in the past is taken as evidence for being right today, then I could give the same exact “special reason why it’s today” every single day; it’ll be wrong every day, which of course is even more evidence in favor of the reasoning process that generated the wrong idea!
There is a multitude of hypotheses that have been wrong until now. Is there a different anti-Occamian prior that favors each one?
In all seriousness, I’m not sure how an anti-Occamian reasoner would even conclude that its crazy hypotheses were wrong. Because “I saw the sun yesterday because it rose” is surely less complex than “the sun failed to rise yesterday but coincidentally I developed a visual processing disorder/superpower that caused me to see a sun that wasn’t there and also gain the ability to see in the dark as if it was broad daylight.”
I guess I’m thinking more of anti-inductive reasoning rather than an anti-Occamian prior.