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A general question about using Bayes' Theorem for calculating the probability of The End of Human Technological Civilisation

8 messages · Philip Rhoades, Evan Cooch, Marc Schwartz +2 more

Original
Philip Rhoades
# 
People,

I have only a general statistics understanding and have never actually 
used Bayes' Theorem for any real-world problem.  My interest lies in 
developing some statistical approach for addressing the subject above 
and it seems to me that BT is what I should be looking at?  However, 
what I am specifically interested in is how such a work-up would be 
developed for a year-on-year situation eg:

I think it is likely that TEHTC could be triggered by a multi-gigaton 
release of methane from the Arctic Ocean and the Siberian Permafrost in 
any Northern Hemisphere Summer from now on (multiple physical and 
non-physical, human positive feedback loops would then kick in).

So, say my estimate (Bayesian Prior) is that for this coming (2019) NHS 
the chance of this triggering NOT occurring is x%.  The manipulation is 
then done to calculate the posterior for 2019 - but for every successive 
year (given the state of the world), isn't it true that the chance of a 
triggering NOT occurring in the NHS MUST go down? - ie it is just an 
argument about the scale of the change from year to year?

It seems to be that the posterior for one year becomes the prior for the 
next year?  Once the prior gets small enough people won't bother with 
the calculations anyway . .

Does anyone know of any existing work on this topic?  I want to write a 
plain-English doc about it but I want to have the stats clear in my head 
. .

Thanks,

Phil.
David Winsemius
# 
Rhelp is not a forum for discussions of statistics. Instead it is for 
persons who have specific questions about the use of R.

Please read the list info page where you started the subscription 
process. And do read the Posting Guide. Both these are linked at the 
bottom of this response.

There are Web accessible forums that are set up to statistics.
Evan Cooch
# 
Just curious -- if R-help is a moderated list (which? in theory , it is 
-- my posts have been 'modertated', to the degree that they aren't 
released to the list until someone approves them), and if these 
'statistics discussion' questions are inappropriate to the mission (as 
described), then...why isn't the 'moderator' (him/her/they) blocking on 
submission?
On 3/19/2019 1:59 PM, David Winsemius wrote:
Marc Schwartz
# 
Evan,

While I cannot speak for the R-Help moderators, which is a 'larger' group, I am a co-moderator for R-Devel.

The initial moderation occurs when someone who has not subscribed to the list sends a post. The list software captures the post and sends the moderators a notification that there is a post from a non-subscriber requiring manual review.

If the post is not relevant to the specific R list and should be sent to another R list, where it is better suited given the focus of the topic, the post will be rejected and the poster informed of the reason. If it is not truly R related, per se, then a recommendation to send the post to StackExchange or similar will be send back to the poster, with a rejection of the post.

Once a sender's e-mail account has been approved to post, which generally means that they have both subscribed to the list in question and have sent at least one relevant post to the list, future posts are typically no longer moderated.

It is possible that once in a while, a moderator will miss something in the post content and approve it going to the list, but that should be a rare event.

A search of the R-Help archives suggests that Philip has posted previously, going to back at least 2011, which is likely why this particular post managed to not be moderated.

Regards,

Marc Schwartz
David Winsemius
# 
Actually the list is not moderated in the usual sense of the word. If 
you subscribe, your posts are not moderated. Only your first posting 
after subscription would be moderated, but for the purpose of preventing 
persons with obvious spamming goals.

And there are several different moderators. If I had seen that posting, 
I might have rejected it.
Jeff Newmiller
# 
Highly off topic. Try StackOverflow.
On March 19, 2019 10:42:24 AM PDT, Philip Rhoades <phil at pricom.com.au> wrote:

  
    

      
      
    

  


  


      

    

    

      
      

        


  

        

      David Winsemius
    

    

      
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On 3/19/19 12:49 PM, Jeff Newmiller wrote:

            

      
      
      
    

        
As it stands it's off-topic for SO. (You would just be making more work 
for those of us who know the rules but need 4 close votes for 
migration.)? Better would be immediately posting at CrossValidated.com 
(i.e., stats.stackexchange.com)

  
    

      
      
    

  


  


      

    

    

      
      

        


  

        

      Philip Rhoades
    

    

      
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David,

        
On 2019-03-20 12:38, David Winsemius wrote:

            

      
      
      
    

        
Thanks - I will check that out . .

P.