[Stormbinder]

Originally posted by Zapmeister:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Stormbinder:
but you can, assuming that you posses enough historical related information, operate with terms such as "very likely", "possible", "highly unlikely", etc.

Mmm, I know people do use those terms when addressing questions of historical fact. My point was that they're misusing the terms to describe their confidence in their belief, rather than to quantify a probability. I think.

---

Perhaps, to some degree. But there have to be some connection between the "pure probability" that you are searching for Zapmeister, and personal confidence of the professianals who posses all related knowledge and expertise in this specific matter, don't you think? Granted, often it maybe hard to express in exact numbers though.


Besides, let's assume for the sake of argument that you are right about historical facts. But than the same logic could be aplied to almost every other none-historical field as well. For example take jurisprudence. One could argue that the jury, (or professional judjes in some cases/countries) when they are declaring "guilty" or "not guilty" verdicts, based upon "beyond reasonable doubts" clause as requred by law, are also operating outside the field of probabilities. But if this is true, that they might as well deciding wether they like the guy or not, without listening to any evidence. Or even throw the coin and see if it is heads or tails. If these all are purely existantial matters and have nothing to do with probabilities than I think one could successefully argue for such aproaches over the ones that is currently employed world-wide. Do you agree?