[extropy-chat] three coins in a fountain.

[scerir]

From: "Julian Assange" 

> I don't think probabilities exist 'in reality', 
> but rather probabilities reflect our lack of knowledge 
> and reality puts constraints on our ability 
> to acquire knowledge.

A probability statement (in general) referes 
to future events. Sometimes I like to think
that probability is the (necessarily subjective) 
expectation value of some relative frequency, or, 
in different words, that probability is 
the predicted relative frequency.

If the above is true, there must be some 'process' 
by which a (subjective) prediction (or a subjective 
expectation value) becomes actual, becomes the 
relative frequency.

When this 'process' is seen as a property of 
a physical system (better: a property of a quantum 
system plus its context), it becomes a 'propensity'
(in Popper's terms), or a 'potentiality' (in Heisenberg).

Notice that when we write something like |cat dead>, 
or |spin up>, very often we should not mean anything 'real', 
anything 'ontic', since the measurement is still 
to be performed, and since (in many cases, but not always) 
our assumption that the result of the measurement 
of a certain operator A depends on the state of the specific 
quantum object we are measuring, and nothing else, 
is flawed ('contextuality' problem). 

s.