24 DEC 2016 by ideonexus

 Natural Selection Resembles Bayesian Inference

The analogy is mathematically precise, and fascinating. In rough terms, it says that the process of natural selection resembles the process of Bayesian inference. A population of organisms can be thought of as having various 'hypotheses' about how to survive—each hypothesis corresponding to a different allele. (Roughly, an allele is one of several alternative versions of a gene.) In each successive generation, the process of natural selection modifies the proportion of organisms having each...
Folksonomies: evolution biology bayesian
Folksonomies: evolution biology bayesian
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13 APR 2013 by ideonexus

 Bayes' Theorem Means Scientific Consensus Should Converge

One property of Bayes’s theorem, in fact, is that our beliefs should converge toward one another—and toward the truth—as we are presented with more evidence over time. In figure 8-8, I’ve worked out an example wherein three investors are trying to determine whether they are in a bull market or a bear market. They start out with very different beliefs about this—one of them is optimistic, and believes there’s a 90 percent chance of a bull market from the outset, while another one i...
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As more and more tests are carried out, scientific opinions should converge around the truth.

13 APR 2013 by ideonexus

 Bayes and Richard Price on Predictions

Bayes’s much more famous work, “An Essay toward Solving a Problem in the Doctrine of Chances,”24 was not published until after his death, when it was brought to the Royal Society’s attention in 1763 by a friend of his named Richard Price. It concerned how we formulate probabilistic beliefs about the world when we encounter new data. Price, in framing Bayes’s essay, gives the example of a person who emerges into the world (perhaps he is Adam, or perhaps he came from Plato’s cave) ...
Folksonomies: statistics predictions
Folksonomies: statistics predictions
  1  notes

Giving the example of someone who watches the sun rise each day, increasing the probability that it will rise again the next day, but that probability never reaching 100 percent.