Posted inStatistics
Fermi’s Paradox & Gaian Bottlenecks
Democracy (the system) is enough to account for the seeming alien life-form which is Hillary and for whatever that thing is on Trump's head. But as queer as Democracy is…
Posted inPodcast
Trust Me. I’m A Scientist — WMBriggs Podcast
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5dzAsvJpC10 Download MP3. You'll have to listen in. This is the busiest time of year for me, so I haven't the time to write out a transcript of the show.…
Posted inPhilosophy Statistics
A Brief Explanation Of Occam’s Razor
We're interested in whether some proposition Y is true. One explanation, perhaps causal or deterministic, or even only probabilistic, is X. Thus, Pr(Y | X) is high or equals 1.…
Posted inCulture
Stream: California Tried To Make Global Warming Skepticism Illegal
Today's post is at The Stream: California To Make Global Warming Skepticism Illegal. "All right, Briggsy. We know you're in there! Throw out your notes on improved cloud parameterizations in…
Posted inPhilosophy SAMT
Summary Against Modern Thought: Arguments Against The World Being Eternal
See the first post in this series for an explanation and guide of our tour of Summa Contra Gentiles. All posts are under the category SAMT. Previous post. We had…
Posted inCulture
Rampant Harassment by Atheists Expected At Reason Rally 2016
The Angry Atheists are meeting today, this time in DC, and evidently they're expecting an uppity crowd, because their Code of Conduct for Reason Rally warns of a host of…
Posted inCulture Philosophy
Animals Aren’t Men, Even If Government Says So
I once saw, with mine own eyes, a squirrel steal an acorn from a second squirrel. This shouldn't be surprising; squirrels are career criminals and everybody knows it. Think of…
Posted inPhilosophy Statistics
The Bayesian Metaphor Can Do More Harm Than Good: Update
Quoting from a post on vampires, "In Bayesian inference, you start with some initial beliefs (called 'Bayesian priors' or just 'priors'), and then you 'update' them as you receive new…