4 ms·
> If I have a single unknown variable in an equation, and I have no way of estimating it, or knowing its variability, or anything, then anything I put down will
by dejb 18y ago
> If I have a single unknown variable in an equation, and I have no way of estimating it, or knowing its variability, or anything, then anything I put down will most likely be wrong and will likely be off by several orders of magnitude.
Actually if you know nothing about the variable then you will almost certainly be off by an infinite number of orders of magnitude (log(infinity) = infinity). Saying that you might be wrong by several orders of magnitude implies that you do know quite a bit about the range of the variable.
By definition most judgements are based on incomplete information. Otherwise no judgement is needed. So the argument that an action should or should not be taken because the evidence is not 100% complete is spurious.
- wlievens 18y agoMost of the Drake Equation factors are fractions in the range [0, 1]. So you do know a lot about the range of the variable.
- mindslight 18y agoBut that's just self-deception facilitated by using a linear instead of a log scale. It's easy to choose a conservative "really small" number of 1% or .01%, but what's to say that you're still not off by many orders of magnitude?
- yummyfajitas 18y agoIn simple terms, this bound tells us that the probability that aliens exist lies somewhere in [0,1].
- dejb 18y agoBy definition all probabilities lie in this range. It doesn't change the fact that within this range of R (Real Numbers) the number of logarithms are uncountable. In simple terms... for every real number >1 (let's call that number x) the number 1/x also exists. Mind blowing huh! .. Also I was primarily talking about the TTAPS equation which seemed to be the main focus of the parent's threads.