[extropy-chat] Re: Formulating a bet

[Brett Paatsch]

Damien Broderick wrote:

> At 12:10 PM 3/24/2005 -0500, Robin wrote:
> 
>>You can bet on anything you can get judges to decide, which is
>> pretty much anything.  The question is how well that judge
>> decision correlates with the real dispute you are having.
> 
> Quite so.

>... In the hard version of this case (that is, the efficacy of 
> destructive reconstruction following cryonic suspension), it seems
> to me equivalent of setting up a bet with a panel of judges who
> might be Muslims or lunatics or might not, testing the assertion
> that men who die faithful obtain the services of 72 virgins, .....

I am surprised that that is how it seems to you Damien.

Do you think that there are issues involved that are outside the
domains of science, logic and language?  If so I'd like to know
what you think those are? (I accept that questions that conflate
those domains might be harder to judge but that doesn't make
them impossible to judge. Indeed most scientific analysis would
involve logic and language as well).

I can see how a two sides picking 'jurors'  to judge the question 
"do men who die faithful obtain the services of 72 virgins" might
both be interested in candidates under the heading of "Muslim"
or "lunatic", perhaps with one side hoping the exclude such 
candidates (all else being equal) and the other hoping to include
at least the "Muslims" (all else being equal).

But that sort of comparison isn't relevant here. 

Stripped of the foolish prejudices of the grossly ignorant or
completely incurious, the question "can cryonics work?" is not
at all a stupid one. You and I have thought about it. Frankly if I
knew nothing else about a person other than that they had 
considered that question at some point in their lives (as Robin and
Hal and others on this list have done) then regardless of what their
answers were I'd consider those people more rather than less likely
to be intelligent and educated and the sort of people I'd respect. 

My point is that I don't see Robin or Hal as having in any way
renounced respect for rationality or science merely by disagreeing
with me. And I don't think see why they would think that it would
be excessively difficult to find judges that could consider logical
arguments from advocates on both sides of the case fairly. 

If they did think they could not, (which I am not asserting), that
would seem to suggest that they would think that they hold a 
particular exclusivity of enlightenment of some form that cannot
be operationally converted into a filter for selecting potential
candidate judges.  I don't think they think that because both 
have written and thought enough about self-serving biases to
be pretty well aware of that sort of thing working on 
themselves.  

I think they know picking judges to judge complicated matters
of logic would mean that judges might, being humans, make
errors, but that that sort of risk (which each of us has to 
tolerate all the time by virtue of living as a member in a society)
is itself manageable, and perhaps, less of a risk than the risks 
of not capitalising on an opportunity.

Perhaps there are not as many occassions when likeminded
individuals bring their attentions to esoteric topics as people
may think. Opportunities for synergies missed may not present
again as people get busy with other things in life and move on. 

Regards,
Brett Paatsch