Από την δεκαετία του 1970 και μετά η κεντρική θεωρία που έχει κυριαρχήσει στην χρηματοοικονομική επιστήμη είναι η Θεωρία της Αποτελεσματικής Αγοράς (ΘΑΑ, Efficient Market Hypothesis). Περιληπτικά, η ΘΑΑ πρεσβεύει ότι κάθε στιγμή, οι παρούσες τιμές των αξιογράφων αντικατοπτρίζουν πλήρως κάθε σχετική και διαθέσιμη πληροφορία (συμπεριλαμβανομένων και των γεγονότων που η αγορά αναμένει ότι θα συμβούν στο μέλλον) κατά τρόπο γρήγορο και ακριβή (..) είναι δηλαδή τίμιες και ορθολογικές.
Αρα η σημερινή μεταβολή της τιμής μιας μετοχής είναι ανεξάρτητη από την χθεσινή μεταβολή, οι μεταβολέ ςδηλαδή, σε μια αποτελεσματική αγορά, θα είναι τυχαίες μεταβλητές που ακολουθουν μια τυχαία διαδικασία (Random Walk).
[ Η πραγματικότητα βέβαια μας δείχνει εμπειρικές και θεωρητικές προκλήσεις όπως : Φούσκες Τιμών, Ημερολογιακές Ανωμαλίες (January Effect, Monday Effect), Αντίδραση χωρίς Νέες Πληροφορίες (17 Οκτωβρίου 1987 πτώση DOW 22,6% Χωρίς σημαντικά νέα), Κέρδη από Contrarian and Momentum Στρατηγηκές, Morning sunshine Effect, Μόνιμες αποκλίσεις από τις τιμές ισορροπίας πχ εισαγωγή Yahho at S&P500 άνοδος κατά 24% σε μία μέρα χωρίς εκμετάλευση από τους arbitrageurs]
Oι Kahneman & Tversky ανέπτυξαν το 1979 την Θεωρία Προοπτικής (Prospect Theory).
Οι άνθρωποι δίνουν μεγαλύτερη στάθμιση (over-weigh) σε ενδεχόμενα που θεωρούνται βέβαια (certain) σε σχέση με ενδεχόμενα που θεωρούνται απλά πιθανά (Certainty Effect)
(.) Η προτίμηση μεταξύ αρνητικών προοπτικών είναι η ακριβής αντανάκλαση των προτιμήσεων μεταξύ των θετικών προοπτικών. (Reflection Effect)
Εαν αλλάξουμε τον τρόπο παρουσίασης των πιθανοτήτων ή/και ενδεχομένων του προβλήματος τα άτομα μπορεί να αλλάξουν προτιμήσεις.
Η αξία της χρησιμότητας δεν μετριέται από τα άτομα με τελικές καταστάσεις πλούτου αλλά με τις μεταβολές στον πλούτο
Η συνάρτηση αξίας θα είναι (α) οριζόμενη με βάση αποκλίσεις από ένα σημείο αναφοράς, (β) γενικά κοίλη για τα κέρδη και συνήθως κυρτή για τις ζημίες, και (γ) πιο απότομη (steeper) στην περιοχή των ζημιών από ότι στην περιοχή των κερδών. [Οι ζημίες επηρεάζουν περίπου 2,25 φορές παραπάνω από την χαρά που δίνουν αντίστοιχα κέρδη]
Στην Συμπεριφορική Χρηματοοικονομική θεωρείται ότι οι άνθρωποι παίρνουν συχνά αποφάσεις και λύνουν προβλήματα βασιζόμενοι σε "ευριστικούς κανόνες" (heuristics) και με μελοληψία (bias) και επίσης η παρουσίαση/διατύπωση/πλαισίωση (framing) του προβλήματος επηρεάζει την απόφαση.
Οι επόμενες υποενότητες εξετάζουν τους βασικότερους ευριστικούς κανόνες και συμπεριφορές που ενδεχομένως επηρεάζουν άμεσα τις επενδυτικές αποφάσεις.
*Αντιπροσωπευτικότητα (Representativeness)
*Αγελαία Συμπεριφορά (Herd Behavior)
*Υπερ-αυτοπεποίθηση (Overconfidence)
*Αγκίστρωση (Anchoring) και Συντηρητισμός (Conservatism)
Ενας ειδικός τύπος συντηρητικής συμπεριφοράς είναι και η αποστροφή για την αβεβαιότητα (Aversion to Ambiguity) δηλαδή ο φόβος που έχουν οι άνθρωποι για το άγνωστο ή για περιπτώσεις όπυ οι κατανομές πιθανοτήτων δεν είναι υποκειμενικά γνωστές. Σε αυτές τις περιπτώσεις οι άνθρωποι τείνουν να παίρνουν πιο "ασφαλείς" αποφάσεις. Παρατηρήστε ότι στην πραγματικότητα οι πιθανότητες ΣΠΑΝΙΑ είναι γνωστές. Ο Knight (1921) ορίζει τον κίνδυνο ως ένα στοίχημα με γνωστές παραμέτρους (δηλαδή κατανομές πιθανοτήτων) και την αβεβαιότητα σαν ένα στοίχημα με άγνωστες παραμέτρους (κατανομές πιθανοτήτων) και θεωρεί ότι οι άνθρωποι αποφεύγουν την αβεβαιότητα περισσότερο από τον κίνδυνο.
*Μεροληψία Διαθεσιμότητας (Availability Bias)
Οι άνθρωποι συχνά κάνουν μεροληπτικές κρίσεις σχετικά με την πιθανότητα να συμβεί ένα γεγονός με βάση το πόσο εύκολα μπορούν να νακαλέσουν στην μνήμη τους παρόμοια γεγονότα. Αυτό οδηγεί στο να δίνουν οι άνθρωποι μεγαλύτερη αβύτητα (υπερ-σταθμίζοντας) σε πληροφορία που μπορεί να ανακληθεί εύκολα από την μνήμη ή σε πληροφορία που έχει κάνει μεγάλη εντύπωση.
*Το Λάθος του Παίκτη (Gambler's Fallacy)
*Κανόνας των Συναισθημάτων (Affect Heuristric)
Οι άνθρωποι συχνά έχουν την ψευδαίσθηση ότι παίρνουν ορθολογικές αποφάσεις όταν στην πραγματικότητα πρώτα αποφασίζουν και μετά προσπαθούν να δικαιολογήσουν τις αποφάσεις τους.
*Φόβος της Μετάνοιας (Fear of Regret)
*Το σύνδρομο της προσωπικής επιλογής (Touchy-feely syndrome)
*Διατύπωση και πλαισίωση της προοπτικής (Framing)
*Νοητική Λογιστική (Mental Accounting)
*Το φαινόμενο του διαθέσιμου χρήματος (House Money Effect)
*Μυωπική αποστροφή της Ζημίας (Myopic Loss Aversion)
Σπύρος Ι. Σπύρου
Εισαγωγή στην Συμπεριφορική Χρηματοοικονομική
Κεφαλαιαγορές & Επενδυτική Ψυχολογία
Κυριακή 17 Ιανουαρίου 2010
Σάββατο 16 Ιανουαρίου 2010
Conversations on Consciousness
There are two kinds of representations. There are theoretical representations,
like knowing about consciousness within a certain theory
that brain scientists or psychologists have made. That is one way
of gaining knowledge about consciousness and what you really are.
It is stored in books, computers, and ongoing scientific discourse.
Another way of accessing reality is through a phenomenal representation,
in the way your conscious mind, your brain, happens to depict
reality and yourself. Scientific representations of the world, and of
consciousness, aim at maximal objectivity, at being very parsimonious,
at not introducing superfluous entities, and at making good
predictions. Phenomenal representations are clever in a different way
because they had a completely different purpose: they were needed
to help our parents and grandparents and all our ancestors to survive
and copy their genes. Their target was not to generate a faithful representation
of reality or of the brain, or the way we sensorily perceive
the world; they had a completely different goal, and certain illusions
can be functionally adequate—as philosophers say of misrepresentations:
the belief in your own existence as a distinct self or, to say something
more provocative, the belief that life is actually worth living, can
be very successful in copying genes.
I think one task may be to go, with introspective attention, into the
real, deep structure of conscious experience without making theories,
without naming things, without relating them to anything in the past,
and to see whether there is anything like selfhood as such there,
independent of all descriptions or whatever beliefs or pet ideologies
we may happen to have.
But then maybe there are areas in human life where the point is not,
as in science or philosophy, to find out the true fact of the matter;
maybe there are areas of life where you should just rest in effortless
attention and dissolve in the present moment, and there is no reward
to be gotten, no message to be brought home; this could be true too.
Thomas Metzinger
like knowing about consciousness within a certain theory
that brain scientists or psychologists have made. That is one way
of gaining knowledge about consciousness and what you really are.
It is stored in books, computers, and ongoing scientific discourse.
Another way of accessing reality is through a phenomenal representation,
in the way your conscious mind, your brain, happens to depict
reality and yourself. Scientific representations of the world, and of
consciousness, aim at maximal objectivity, at being very parsimonious,
at not introducing superfluous entities, and at making good
predictions. Phenomenal representations are clever in a different way
because they had a completely different purpose: they were needed
to help our parents and grandparents and all our ancestors to survive
and copy their genes. Their target was not to generate a faithful representation
of reality or of the brain, or the way we sensorily perceive
the world; they had a completely different goal, and certain illusions
can be functionally adequate—as philosophers say of misrepresentations:
the belief in your own existence as a distinct self or, to say something
more provocative, the belief that life is actually worth living, can
be very successful in copying genes.
I think one task may be to go, with introspective attention, into the
real, deep structure of conscious experience without making theories,
without naming things, without relating them to anything in the past,
and to see whether there is anything like selfhood as such there,
independent of all descriptions or whatever beliefs or pet ideologies
we may happen to have.
But then maybe there are areas in human life where the point is not,
as in science or philosophy, to find out the true fact of the matter;
maybe there are areas of life where you should just rest in effortless
attention and dissolve in the present moment, and there is no reward
to be gotten, no message to be brought home; this could be true too.
Thomas Metzinger
Παρασκευή 15 Ιανουαρίου 2010
Conversations on Consciousness
Sue What is it about consciousness that makes it so interesting?
Stephen Consciousness makes consciousness interesting. It’s exactly that
self-similar quality, the fractal nature of it, which makes it so endlessly
fascinating.
Sue This implies that if we have these two related kinds of illusion and you
can wake up in a dream and say, ‘Oh, but now I realize it’s a dream,’
you might be able to wake up in waking life in the same way—and have
lucid living.
Stephen Yes, certainly. The religious, esoteric, religious traditions of
enlightenment talk about that exactly, and lucid dreaming seems
to be one of the best metaphors for what that enlightenment would
be like.
Here you are in a dream that you don’t know is a dream, and so you
have a very limited view of what your possibilities are, who you are,
what you’re doing there, and what really matters. Suddenly you
remember that you’re dreaming and that changes everything. And in
the same sense with enlightenment, it’s said that one comes to understand
a deeper level of unity. Normally we are acutely, uncomfortably
aware of separateness and the fact that there’s a great distinction
between Sue and Stephen. You’re over there and I’m over here; but
there’s another level on which we both have something in common:
not the self, but the ‘I’, the experiencer. When you tease this apart
you find out that there’s no way to distinguish the ultimate nature of
that experiencer in Stephen or in Sue, because the stuff that distinguishes—
Stephen’s name, his birth-date, all his physical characteristics
and all that—is the stuff which is not necessary to being who I am.
Sue You’re saying that if you were to wake up in waking life, which might
be called enlightenment, somehow this separateness would disappear;
the self would disappear? Yet in a lucid dream it almost seems the other
way round: when you wake up you feel more yourself, as though before
I became lucid it wasn’t really me dreaming, but now I’m actually here
in my dream.
Stephen Yes, but it depends on what you mean by ‘yourself’. Do you
mean, ‘I feel more like who I am,’ or is it this person that people call
Sue Blackmore? You don’t feel more like the outside view of you, you
feel more like the inside you, and that’s the point: to really feel that
identity is something like the difference between snowflakes. Suppose
we take ourselves to be individual snowflakes with a particular
crystalline form. Certainly there’s a difference between the two, they
have different structures. And here one snowflake is falling into the
ocean; what does it fear? ‘I’m about to be annihilated, I’ll disappear,
I’ll be gone, nothing.’ But perhaps what happens instead—and this is
a metaphor for death or enlightenment—is an infinite expansion, as
you remember that you’re not just that one drop of frozen water, but
that you are water. So this metaphor of substance is another level
that is simultaneously present with the form; the separation doesn’t
disappear: it’s just that it’s only the form; the substance is unity.
Sue When you were talking about enlightenment, you described it as something
like the individual or self, slipping into a great unity. Could you
say, in the question of free will, that the choices are coming not from
this little conscious you, nor even from this body, but from everything?
Stephen Yes, and that’s why it depends on what you mean by ‘me’. When
I speak of the totality that I am I don’t mean just this complex body
stuff here; what compelling reason do I have to limit it to that? Given
the experiences I’ve had, I have to keep an open mind on the question
‘What am I?’
Stephen LaBerge
Stephen Consciousness makes consciousness interesting. It’s exactly that
self-similar quality, the fractal nature of it, which makes it so endlessly
fascinating.
Sue This implies that if we have these two related kinds of illusion and you
can wake up in a dream and say, ‘Oh, but now I realize it’s a dream,’
you might be able to wake up in waking life in the same way—and have
lucid living.
Stephen Yes, certainly. The religious, esoteric, religious traditions of
enlightenment talk about that exactly, and lucid dreaming seems
to be one of the best metaphors for what that enlightenment would
be like.
Here you are in a dream that you don’t know is a dream, and so you
have a very limited view of what your possibilities are, who you are,
what you’re doing there, and what really matters. Suddenly you
remember that you’re dreaming and that changes everything. And in
the same sense with enlightenment, it’s said that one comes to understand
a deeper level of unity. Normally we are acutely, uncomfortably
aware of separateness and the fact that there’s a great distinction
between Sue and Stephen. You’re over there and I’m over here; but
there’s another level on which we both have something in common:
not the self, but the ‘I’, the experiencer. When you tease this apart
you find out that there’s no way to distinguish the ultimate nature of
that experiencer in Stephen or in Sue, because the stuff that distinguishes—
Stephen’s name, his birth-date, all his physical characteristics
and all that—is the stuff which is not necessary to being who I am.
Sue You’re saying that if you were to wake up in waking life, which might
be called enlightenment, somehow this separateness would disappear;
the self would disappear? Yet in a lucid dream it almost seems the other
way round: when you wake up you feel more yourself, as though before
I became lucid it wasn’t really me dreaming, but now I’m actually here
in my dream.
Stephen Yes, but it depends on what you mean by ‘yourself’. Do you
mean, ‘I feel more like who I am,’ or is it this person that people call
Sue Blackmore? You don’t feel more like the outside view of you, you
feel more like the inside you, and that’s the point: to really feel that
identity is something like the difference between snowflakes. Suppose
we take ourselves to be individual snowflakes with a particular
crystalline form. Certainly there’s a difference between the two, they
have different structures. And here one snowflake is falling into the
ocean; what does it fear? ‘I’m about to be annihilated, I’ll disappear,
I’ll be gone, nothing.’ But perhaps what happens instead—and this is
a metaphor for death or enlightenment—is an infinite expansion, as
you remember that you’re not just that one drop of frozen water, but
that you are water. So this metaphor of substance is another level
that is simultaneously present with the form; the separation doesn’t
disappear: it’s just that it’s only the form; the substance is unity.
Sue When you were talking about enlightenment, you described it as something
like the individual or self, slipping into a great unity. Could you
say, in the question of free will, that the choices are coming not from
this little conscious you, nor even from this body, but from everything?
Stephen Yes, and that’s why it depends on what you mean by ‘me’. When
I speak of the totality that I am I don’t mean just this complex body
stuff here; what compelling reason do I have to limit it to that? Given
the experiences I’ve had, I have to keep an open mind on the question
‘What am I?’
Stephen LaBerge
Πέμπτη 14 Ιανουαρίου 2010
Conversations on Consciousness
The other way of looking at it is that consciousness, or perhaps
something proto-conscious, is fundamental to the universe; it’s part
of our reality, much like spin, or mass, or charge. I mean there are certain
irreducible things in physics that you just have to say ‘they’re
there’ and consciousness is like that. This is the view that Dave
Chalmers took in his book, which followed the talk I mentioned. He
said that consciousness must involve something fundamental, something
that’s intrinsic to the universe, and I agree with that.
Now, where we disagree is that he thinks that this fundamental
entity, whatever it is, can be attained at various levels, whereas
Roger Penrose and I think that the qualia, if they are fundamental,
must exist at the fundamental level of the universe, the lowest
level of reality that exists. In modern physics that’s best described
at the Planck scale, the level at which space-time geometry is no
longer smooth but quantized. When you go down in scale to roughly
10–33 cm you get to this level of space–time where there is a granularity,
and that’s the fundamental level. It is at that level where we think
qualia are embedded as patterns in this fundamental granularity
of space–time geometry that makes up the universe. Roger had also
suggested that Platonic values in mathematics as well as ethics and
aesthetics were embedded there.
Sue But I don’t see how talking about the Planck scale, and other levels
of physics, relates in any way to the problem we’re talking about.
That is, that sitting here I’m experiencing a world. There is this complicated
world appearing around me, with you and me, my body and yours
in this space here. What has that to do with all these microscopic
details?
Stuart Your complicated world is described by two sets of laws—
Newton’s laws and so forth at the macroscopic level, but the bizarre
laws of quantum mechanics at small scales. Particles may exist in multiple
places simultaneously—superpositions—be interconnected over
distances, and time is reversible. The problem is we don’t know how
small is small. The boundary between the quantum world and the
everyday world—quantum state reduction, or the so-called collapse
of the wave function—is a big question in physics and seems to have
something to do with consciousness.
The point is that our perceived reality—the everyday classical
world—precipitates from the ‘microscopic details’, as you put it,
conscious moment by conscious moment. Quantum computers do
this—multiple possibilities reduce or collapse to the answer. So in
our unconscious minds we have superpositions of multiple possible
choices or perceptions which reduce or collapse to one particular
choice or perception, say, 40 times per second. Each reduction
chooses a set of qualia.
So I would say that the image you have in your brain right now of
looking at me, trying to understand what I’m saying, the surroundings,
and our environment, is like a painting (if you will allow me a
metaphor) and the qualia, the proto-conscious qualia that I’m talking
about, are like the paints on a palette. The artist doing a painting has
a palette with all these different, simple, primitive colours, and he or
she integrates them into a complex scene. So, similarly, I would argue,
our brains are able to access the qualia at this fundamental level, but
only a particular type of quantum process is able to do that.
Sue So can you explain briefly what kind of quantum process you’re
talking about, and where it happens in the brain?
Stuart Roger Penrose developed this idea in his book The Emperor’s New
Mind in 1989. He argued, using Gödel’s theorem, that our minds do
things that are non-computable; that are non-algorithmic. They
are inherently different from conventional classical computers. Roger
deduced this non-computable element much like Sherlock Holmes
followed clues to find the murderer, sometimes very obscure and
subtle clues, to find that the only source in the universe for this noncomputable
influence is the particular type of collapse of the wave
function due to quantum gravity at the fundamental Planck scale.
Not only does it connect to qualia, it brings in a non-algorithmic—
a non-computable—factor which distinguishes our choices from
those of computers. So he was proposing a certain type of quantum
computing in the brain.
But Roger didn’t have a good candidate for quantum computing in
the brain, only suggesting the possibility of superpositions of nerves
both firing and not firing. I had been studying the computational
capabilities of protein structures called microtubules which make
up the internal scaffolding within nerve cells. It seemed that microtubules
were excellent candidates for quantum computation, that
quantum computing might be happening inside nerve cells where
they could be isolated. I also knew from my study of anaesthesia that
the molecular mechanisms by which anaesthetic gas molecules erase
consciousness involve only quantum mechanical interactions with
certain proteins in the brain. So it was reasonable to believe that consciousness
involved quantum processes and that microtubules might
be quantum computers.
It could work like this. Let’s say you’re looking at the menu at
the Mexican restaurant for lunch and you consider the tostada, or the
burrito, or the chimichanga. In your subconscious mind you have a
superposition of all three of these. Then it collapses and you choose
the chimichanga. Maybe some non-computable Platonic value influenced
your choice. That’s the way to look at volition.
Sue It sounds as though you believe in free will?
Stuart I have no choice but to believe in free will!
Free will, of course, is one of those very difficult issues, but I think
in this approach we can actually explain it in the following way. In
the model Roger and I have developed, we have quantum computation
in the microtubules inside neurons that reaches the threshold
for collapse 40 times a second, to coincide with the 40 Hz gamma
oscillations that exist in the brain. And the outcome of each reduction
is a process of quantum superposition, quantum computation, which
follows the Schrödinger equation, which is basically deterministic.
However, at the instant of collapse there’s another influence that
enters. This is Roger’s non-computable influence which is due to the
fine grain in space–time geometry. This has a little influence on the
choices, so that choices result from both the deterministic quantum
computation and this non-computable influence. The experience of
that is free will.
Now I think of it this way. To make an analogy, imagine you’ve
trained a zombie robot to sail a sailboat across a lake, and there’s
three ports on the other side, A, B, or C, and the wind is shifting constantly.
So the wind in this case is going to play the role of the noncomputable
influences, and the tacking and jibing of the boat are
going to be the algorithmic deterministic processes that the robot
zombie has been trained to do. But each time he or she tacks it’s going
to be influenced by this non-computable influence, so that the outcome—
the port A, B, or C at which the boat lands—will be a result of
both. I think the experience of exerting this deterministic process
along with this non-computable influence is what we call free will.
Therefore, we occasionally do things that are more or less unexpected
even to ourselves.
I think this is exactly what is happening, consciousness ‘dances
on the edge between the quantum world and the classical world’.
And the more we are influenced and in touch with the quantum
subconscious world of enlightenment, the happier we can be.
Stuart Hameroff
something proto-conscious, is fundamental to the universe; it’s part
of our reality, much like spin, or mass, or charge. I mean there are certain
irreducible things in physics that you just have to say ‘they’re
there’ and consciousness is like that. This is the view that Dave
Chalmers took in his book, which followed the talk I mentioned. He
said that consciousness must involve something fundamental, something
that’s intrinsic to the universe, and I agree with that.
Now, where we disagree is that he thinks that this fundamental
entity, whatever it is, can be attained at various levels, whereas
Roger Penrose and I think that the qualia, if they are fundamental,
must exist at the fundamental level of the universe, the lowest
level of reality that exists. In modern physics that’s best described
at the Planck scale, the level at which space-time geometry is no
longer smooth but quantized. When you go down in scale to roughly
10–33 cm you get to this level of space–time where there is a granularity,
and that’s the fundamental level. It is at that level where we think
qualia are embedded as patterns in this fundamental granularity
of space–time geometry that makes up the universe. Roger had also
suggested that Platonic values in mathematics as well as ethics and
aesthetics were embedded there.
Sue But I don’t see how talking about the Planck scale, and other levels
of physics, relates in any way to the problem we’re talking about.
That is, that sitting here I’m experiencing a world. There is this complicated
world appearing around me, with you and me, my body and yours
in this space here. What has that to do with all these microscopic
details?
Stuart Your complicated world is described by two sets of laws—
Newton’s laws and so forth at the macroscopic level, but the bizarre
laws of quantum mechanics at small scales. Particles may exist in multiple
places simultaneously—superpositions—be interconnected over
distances, and time is reversible. The problem is we don’t know how
small is small. The boundary between the quantum world and the
everyday world—quantum state reduction, or the so-called collapse
of the wave function—is a big question in physics and seems to have
something to do with consciousness.
The point is that our perceived reality—the everyday classical
world—precipitates from the ‘microscopic details’, as you put it,
conscious moment by conscious moment. Quantum computers do
this—multiple possibilities reduce or collapse to the answer. So in
our unconscious minds we have superpositions of multiple possible
choices or perceptions which reduce or collapse to one particular
choice or perception, say, 40 times per second. Each reduction
chooses a set of qualia.
So I would say that the image you have in your brain right now of
looking at me, trying to understand what I’m saying, the surroundings,
and our environment, is like a painting (if you will allow me a
metaphor) and the qualia, the proto-conscious qualia that I’m talking
about, are like the paints on a palette. The artist doing a painting has
a palette with all these different, simple, primitive colours, and he or
she integrates them into a complex scene. So, similarly, I would argue,
our brains are able to access the qualia at this fundamental level, but
only a particular type of quantum process is able to do that.
Sue So can you explain briefly what kind of quantum process you’re
talking about, and where it happens in the brain?
Stuart Roger Penrose developed this idea in his book The Emperor’s New
Mind in 1989. He argued, using Gödel’s theorem, that our minds do
things that are non-computable; that are non-algorithmic. They
are inherently different from conventional classical computers. Roger
deduced this non-computable element much like Sherlock Holmes
followed clues to find the murderer, sometimes very obscure and
subtle clues, to find that the only source in the universe for this noncomputable
influence is the particular type of collapse of the wave
function due to quantum gravity at the fundamental Planck scale.
Not only does it connect to qualia, it brings in a non-algorithmic—
a non-computable—factor which distinguishes our choices from
those of computers. So he was proposing a certain type of quantum
computing in the brain.
But Roger didn’t have a good candidate for quantum computing in
the brain, only suggesting the possibility of superpositions of nerves
both firing and not firing. I had been studying the computational
capabilities of protein structures called microtubules which make
up the internal scaffolding within nerve cells. It seemed that microtubules
were excellent candidates for quantum computation, that
quantum computing might be happening inside nerve cells where
they could be isolated. I also knew from my study of anaesthesia that
the molecular mechanisms by which anaesthetic gas molecules erase
consciousness involve only quantum mechanical interactions with
certain proteins in the brain. So it was reasonable to believe that consciousness
involved quantum processes and that microtubules might
be quantum computers.
It could work like this. Let’s say you’re looking at the menu at
the Mexican restaurant for lunch and you consider the tostada, or the
burrito, or the chimichanga. In your subconscious mind you have a
superposition of all three of these. Then it collapses and you choose
the chimichanga. Maybe some non-computable Platonic value influenced
your choice. That’s the way to look at volition.
Sue It sounds as though you believe in free will?
Stuart I have no choice but to believe in free will!
Free will, of course, is one of those very difficult issues, but I think
in this approach we can actually explain it in the following way. In
the model Roger and I have developed, we have quantum computation
in the microtubules inside neurons that reaches the threshold
for collapse 40 times a second, to coincide with the 40 Hz gamma
oscillations that exist in the brain. And the outcome of each reduction
is a process of quantum superposition, quantum computation, which
follows the Schrödinger equation, which is basically deterministic.
However, at the instant of collapse there’s another influence that
enters. This is Roger’s non-computable influence which is due to the
fine grain in space–time geometry. This has a little influence on the
choices, so that choices result from both the deterministic quantum
computation and this non-computable influence. The experience of
that is free will.
Now I think of it this way. To make an analogy, imagine you’ve
trained a zombie robot to sail a sailboat across a lake, and there’s
three ports on the other side, A, B, or C, and the wind is shifting constantly.
So the wind in this case is going to play the role of the noncomputable
influences, and the tacking and jibing of the boat are
going to be the algorithmic deterministic processes that the robot
zombie has been trained to do. But each time he or she tacks it’s going
to be influenced by this non-computable influence, so that the outcome—
the port A, B, or C at which the boat lands—will be a result of
both. I think the experience of exerting this deterministic process
along with this non-computable influence is what we call free will.
Therefore, we occasionally do things that are more or less unexpected
even to ourselves.
I think this is exactly what is happening, consciousness ‘dances
on the edge between the quantum world and the classical world’.
And the more we are influenced and in touch with the quantum
subconscious world of enlightenment, the happier we can be.
Stuart Hameroff
Τρίτη 12 Ιανουαρίου 2010
Final Cut
A place to stay
"Oi! A real one ..."
Enough to eat
Somewhere old heroes shuffle safely down the street
Where you can speak out loud
About your doubts and fears
And what's more no-one ever disappears
You never hear their standard issue kicking in your door.
You can relax on both sides of the tracks
And maniacs don't blow holes in bandsmen by remote control
And everyone has recourse to the law
And no-one kills the children anymore.
And no one kills the children anymore.
A Gunners Dream
Take all your overgrown infants away somewhere
And build them a home, a little place of their own.
The Fletcher Memorial
Home for Incurable Tyrants and Kings.
And they can appear to themselves every day
On closed circuit T.V.
To make sure they're still real.
It's the only connection they feel.
"Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome, Reagan and Haig,
Mr. Begin and friend, Mrs. Thatcher, and Paisly,
"Hello Maggie!"
Mr. Brezhnev and party.
"Scusi dov'è il bar?"
The ghost of McCarthy,
The memories of Nixon.
"Who's the bald chap?"
"Good-bye!"
And now, adding colour, a group of anonymous latin-
American meat packing glitterati.
Did they expect us to treat them with any respect?
They can polish their medals and sharpen their
Smiles, and amuse themselves playing games for awhile.
Boom boom, bang bang, lie down you're dead
The Fletcher Memorial Home
By the cold and religious we were taken in hand
shown how to feel good and told to feel bad
tongue tied and terrified we learned how to pray
now our feelings run deep and cold as the clay
and strung out behind us the banners and flags
of our possible pasts lie in tatters and rags
Your Possible Pasts
And as the windshield melts
My tears evaporate
Leaving only charcoal to defend
Finally I understand
The feelings of the few
Ashes and diamonds
Foe and friend
We were all equal in the end
Two Suns in the Sunset
Oi...get your filthy hands off my desert!
What e say?
"Oi! A real one ..."
Enough to eat
Somewhere old heroes shuffle safely down the street
Where you can speak out loud
About your doubts and fears
And what's more no-one ever disappears
You never hear their standard issue kicking in your door.
You can relax on both sides of the tracks
And maniacs don't blow holes in bandsmen by remote control
And everyone has recourse to the law
And no-one kills the children anymore.
And no one kills the children anymore.
A Gunners Dream
Take all your overgrown infants away somewhere
And build them a home, a little place of their own.
The Fletcher Memorial
Home for Incurable Tyrants and Kings.
And they can appear to themselves every day
On closed circuit T.V.
To make sure they're still real.
It's the only connection they feel.
"Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome, Reagan and Haig,
Mr. Begin and friend, Mrs. Thatcher, and Paisly,
"Hello Maggie!"
Mr. Brezhnev and party.
"Scusi dov'è il bar?"
The ghost of McCarthy,
The memories of Nixon.
"Who's the bald chap?"
"Good-bye!"
And now, adding colour, a group of anonymous latin-
American meat packing glitterati.
Did they expect us to treat them with any respect?
They can polish their medals and sharpen their
Smiles, and amuse themselves playing games for awhile.
Boom boom, bang bang, lie down you're dead
The Fletcher Memorial Home
By the cold and religious we were taken in hand
shown how to feel good and told to feel bad
tongue tied and terrified we learned how to pray
now our feelings run deep and cold as the clay
and strung out behind us the banners and flags
of our possible pasts lie in tatters and rags
Your Possible Pasts
And as the windshield melts
My tears evaporate
Leaving only charcoal to defend
Finally I understand
The feelings of the few
Ashes and diamonds
Foe and friend
We were all equal in the end
Two Suns in the Sunset
Oi...get your filthy hands off my desert!
What e say?
Δευτέρα 11 Ιανουαρίου 2010
Conversations on Consciousness
In Ben Libet’s 1985 experiments, subjects had to flex their wrist spontaneously
and deliberately at a time of their own choosing. The time of the movement was
measured using EMG (electromyogram) electrodes on their wrist; the start of the
readiness potential in their motor cortex was measured using EEG (electroencephalogram);
the moment at which they consciously decided to move was measured using
a spot revolving on a screen; they had to say (after the movement) where the spot
was at the moment of willing. The results showed that brain activity began nearly
half a second before the will to move. Libet’s controversial experiments have been
interpreted by some as having implications for free will. Sue
Sue You’re being rather coy about your contribution to consciousness studies.
I know you have a theory about the function of consciousness. Tell
me something about that.
Richard OK, the other big question is what consciousness does. I don’t
think it’s uniquely human. I mean you can stand on a dog’s tail and it
yelps. It feels it. That’s my view anyway. So then you must ask yourself
what the function of it is, on the grounds that it wouldn’t evolve unless
it has a survival function. And what strikes me about consciousness is
that it’s very much associated with the present moment.
When you’re perceiving things, the brain has a vast amount of processing
going on from the past. For example, in order to see that cup
in front of us I have to have picked up cups in the past, poured coffee
into them, probably dropped them and broken them, and done all
sorts of things to them. Then I see that cup as a real object, not just
because I’ve got a retinal image and a bunch of signals going into the
cortex, but because it’s evoking all this from the past. Now it seems
to me that you’ve got to live in the present moment; you’ve got to
survive crossing the road. So it really matters that the traffic light is
red or green now, at this moment in time, whereas the processes of
perceiving are spread out in time. So how do you locate the present
moment? I suggest that this is tagged, or flagged if you like, by consciousness.
You’ve got this extraordinary sense of vividness, of qualia,
which always applies to the present moment.
Sue So are you saying then that the function of consciousness is to discriminate
the past and the future from what’s now, and requires action?
Richard Yes, absolutely.
Richard Gregory
and deliberately at a time of their own choosing. The time of the movement was
measured using EMG (electromyogram) electrodes on their wrist; the start of the
readiness potential in their motor cortex was measured using EEG (electroencephalogram);
the moment at which they consciously decided to move was measured using
a spot revolving on a screen; they had to say (after the movement) where the spot
was at the moment of willing. The results showed that brain activity began nearly
half a second before the will to move. Libet’s controversial experiments have been
interpreted by some as having implications for free will. Sue
Sue You’re being rather coy about your contribution to consciousness studies.
I know you have a theory about the function of consciousness. Tell
me something about that.
Richard OK, the other big question is what consciousness does. I don’t
think it’s uniquely human. I mean you can stand on a dog’s tail and it
yelps. It feels it. That’s my view anyway. So then you must ask yourself
what the function of it is, on the grounds that it wouldn’t evolve unless
it has a survival function. And what strikes me about consciousness is
that it’s very much associated with the present moment.
When you’re perceiving things, the brain has a vast amount of processing
going on from the past. For example, in order to see that cup
in front of us I have to have picked up cups in the past, poured coffee
into them, probably dropped them and broken them, and done all
sorts of things to them. Then I see that cup as a real object, not just
because I’ve got a retinal image and a bunch of signals going into the
cortex, but because it’s evoking all this from the past. Now it seems
to me that you’ve got to live in the present moment; you’ve got to
survive crossing the road. So it really matters that the traffic light is
red or green now, at this moment in time, whereas the processes of
perceiving are spread out in time. So how do you locate the present
moment? I suggest that this is tagged, or flagged if you like, by consciousness.
You’ve got this extraordinary sense of vividness, of qualia,
which always applies to the present moment.
Sue So are you saying then that the function of consciousness is to discriminate
the past and the future from what’s now, and requires action?
Richard Yes, absolutely.
Richard Gregory
Πέμπτη 7 Ιανουαρίου 2010
Τετάρτη 6 Ιανουαρίου 2010
Conversations on Consciousness
We know that brains are non-linear dynamical systems. These are
systems that are governed by continuum mathematics, and their behavior
is exquisitely sensitive to infinitesimally small differences,
such that two brains in almost exactly the same state will quickly wind
off in very, very different states. This means that the brain of a human,
or even of a mouse, is a system whose behavior is unpredictable
by any machine constructable in this universe. We are importantly
unpredictable save for general tendencies and patterns. We will go to
sleep at night, get up in the morning, tend to hug our wife at least
three or four times a day, but exactly when, or what words will come
out of my mouth, that’s unpredictable. So one mustn’t fear the story
science seems to tell, that we are just robots.
Patricia and Paul Churchland
[What about the markets which are the outcome of several millions of brains.
The outcome of several millions of non-linear dynamic systems!!!]
systems that are governed by continuum mathematics, and their behavior
is exquisitely sensitive to infinitesimally small differences,
such that two brains in almost exactly the same state will quickly wind
off in very, very different states. This means that the brain of a human,
or even of a mouse, is a system whose behavior is unpredictable
by any machine constructable in this universe. We are importantly
unpredictable save for general tendencies and patterns. We will go to
sleep at night, get up in the morning, tend to hug our wife at least
three or four times a day, but exactly when, or what words will come
out of my mouth, that’s unpredictable. So one mustn’t fear the story
science seems to tell, that we are just robots.
Patricia and Paul Churchland
[What about the markets which are the outcome of several millions of brains.
The outcome of several millions of non-linear dynamic systems!!!]
GC
Considering Sue's temes; maybe evolution is heading to a state where the whole population on earth would be connected with an electrical mean just like high speed internet. Every human will be the equivalent to a neuron potentially connected with every other human (neuron). This is the the structure of the brain; Billions of people connected to something with no center, no special areas; just cloud-like. If the path of evolution inevitably is heading to technology then technology inevitably is heading to a brain-like architectural structure.
If the connection between neurons is responsible for the perception of the world and consciousness is emerging as a property of the whole brain then something like global consciousness is a good probability, and so the good old carbon based biological life form has served its part of the play.
Of course nobody knows what this global consciousness would look like but maybe those days our right hemisphere would have a bigger role than today for balance reasons. Or we would be quite useless to this other state of consciousness for her path of evolution.
This GC is nothing like God, chakra or whatever superficial. Is just the next step of evolution. We transcend from billions separate individual consciousnesses to a higher one or better: evolutionary-advanced one.
Ενα από τα πιο σημαντικά πράγματα αναφορικά με το Διαδίκτυο είναι ότι με ένα κλικ μπορεί κανείς να πάει οπουδήποτε. Δεν υπάρχει γαλλικό ή αγγλικό Διαδίκτυο, όλες οι ιστοσελίδες συνδέονται, δεν είναι ξεχωριστές η μία από την άλλη. Το Διαδίκτυο δεν χωρίζεται σε καλής και κακής ποιότητας έγγραφα, σε ακαδημαικές και εμπορικές ιστοσελίδες. Δεν υπάρχει διάκριση, υπάρχει μόνο ENA Διαδίκτυο, δωρεάν και ανοιχτό για όλους και αυτό είναι το δυνατό του σημείο (...) Οι περισσότεροι άνθρωποι έχουν ιστολόγια που εμπιστεύονται, όπως γνωρίζουν και εμπιστεύονται και ορισμένα άτομα, Οι συστάσεις είναι πολύ σημαντικές για το Διαδίκτυο (...) Στο Διαδίκτυο την απάντηση την φέρνουν οι σύνδεσμοι. Λειτουργούν όταν τους συστήνουν άνθρωποι άξιοι εμπιστοσύνης. Αντίθετα , αν βρείτε κάτι που δεν σας αρέσει, κάνετε ένα βήμα πίσω και δεν ανατρέχεται στους συνδέσμους....Tim Berners-Lee
Sir Timothy John "Tim" Berners-Lee, is a British engineer and computer scientist and MIT professor credited with inventing the World Wide Web.
If the connection between neurons is responsible for the perception of the world and consciousness is emerging as a property of the whole brain then something like global consciousness is a good probability, and so the good old carbon based biological life form has served its part of the play.
Of course nobody knows what this global consciousness would look like but maybe those days our right hemisphere would have a bigger role than today for balance reasons. Or we would be quite useless to this other state of consciousness for her path of evolution.
This GC is nothing like God, chakra or whatever superficial. Is just the next step of evolution. We transcend from billions separate individual consciousnesses to a higher one or better: evolutionary-advanced one.
Ενα από τα πιο σημαντικά πράγματα αναφορικά με το Διαδίκτυο είναι ότι με ένα κλικ μπορεί κανείς να πάει οπουδήποτε. Δεν υπάρχει γαλλικό ή αγγλικό Διαδίκτυο, όλες οι ιστοσελίδες συνδέονται, δεν είναι ξεχωριστές η μία από την άλλη. Το Διαδίκτυο δεν χωρίζεται σε καλής και κακής ποιότητας έγγραφα, σε ακαδημαικές και εμπορικές ιστοσελίδες. Δεν υπάρχει διάκριση, υπάρχει μόνο ENA Διαδίκτυο, δωρεάν και ανοιχτό για όλους και αυτό είναι το δυνατό του σημείο (...) Οι περισσότεροι άνθρωποι έχουν ιστολόγια που εμπιστεύονται, όπως γνωρίζουν και εμπιστεύονται και ορισμένα άτομα, Οι συστάσεις είναι πολύ σημαντικές για το Διαδίκτυο (...) Στο Διαδίκτυο την απάντηση την φέρνουν οι σύνδεσμοι. Λειτουργούν όταν τους συστήνουν άνθρωποι άξιοι εμπιστοσύνης. Αντίθετα , αν βρείτε κάτι που δεν σας αρέσει, κάνετε ένα βήμα πίσω και δεν ανατρέχεται στους συνδέσμους....Tim Berners-Lee
Sir Timothy John "Tim" Berners-Lee, is a British engineer and computer scientist and MIT professor credited with inventing the World Wide Web.
Κυριακή 3 Ιανουαρίου 2010
Conversations on Consciousness
Sue Explain about the China brain.
Ned OK, the idea is that you could assemble a group of people and have
them communicate by satellite or by cell phone, so that each of them
simulated what was in effect a neuron. They would interact by electronic
means in a way that was like the way that neurons in the brain
interact by electronic means.
I called it the China brain, because I said there are a billion people
in China—not really as many neurons as there are in a brain, but
something approaching that. They together would then control a
body; all these people would be jointly the brain of that body, that
robot. So the idea is that the robot, including its brain, might be functionally
equivalent to a human being, in the sense that there are some
corresponding states that interact with each other in a corresponding
way. The question is whether the robot has phenomenology. Maybe
there’s no phenomenology, nobody home.
Sue Is that what you think?
Ned I don’t say that I know that, because obviously I don’t, and it’s something
for which scientific investigation is required. But if you believe
in a neurological theory of consciousness you’re going to be somewhat
sceptical about whether this thing that is neurologically quite
different from us, so different really in this extreme way, would have
phenomenology. I think only a functionalist or a behaviourist, like
Dennett say, would be sure that it does have phenomenology. So that’s
one kind of zombie, the zombie that’s physically completely different
from us, although functionally similar, with some set of corresponding
states that interact in the same way and produce the same kind
of behavior..... Ned Block
This raises deep questions of metaphysics. What is there in the
world? What are the basic components of the world? In physics
this happens all the time. Nobody tries to explain, say space or time
in terms of something which is more basic than space or time. It’s
the same with mass or charge. They end up taking something as fundamental.
My own view is that to be consistent we have to say the
same thing about consciousness. If it turns out that the facts about
consciousness can’t be derived from the fundamental physical properties
we already have, like space and time and mass and charge, then
the consistent thing to say is, ‘OK, then consciousness isn’t to be
reduced. It’s irreducible. It’s fundamental. It’s a basic feature of the
world.’.....
David Chalmers
Ned OK, the idea is that you could assemble a group of people and have
them communicate by satellite or by cell phone, so that each of them
simulated what was in effect a neuron. They would interact by electronic
means in a way that was like the way that neurons in the brain
interact by electronic means.
I called it the China brain, because I said there are a billion people
in China—not really as many neurons as there are in a brain, but
something approaching that. They together would then control a
body; all these people would be jointly the brain of that body, that
robot. So the idea is that the robot, including its brain, might be functionally
equivalent to a human being, in the sense that there are some
corresponding states that interact with each other in a corresponding
way. The question is whether the robot has phenomenology. Maybe
there’s no phenomenology, nobody home.
Sue Is that what you think?
Ned I don’t say that I know that, because obviously I don’t, and it’s something
for which scientific investigation is required. But if you believe
in a neurological theory of consciousness you’re going to be somewhat
sceptical about whether this thing that is neurologically quite
different from us, so different really in this extreme way, would have
phenomenology. I think only a functionalist or a behaviourist, like
Dennett say, would be sure that it does have phenomenology. So that’s
one kind of zombie, the zombie that’s physically completely different
from us, although functionally similar, with some set of corresponding
states that interact in the same way and produce the same kind
of behavior..... Ned Block
This raises deep questions of metaphysics. What is there in the
world? What are the basic components of the world? In physics
this happens all the time. Nobody tries to explain, say space or time
in terms of something which is more basic than space or time. It’s
the same with mass or charge. They end up taking something as fundamental.
My own view is that to be consistent we have to say the
same thing about consciousness. If it turns out that the facts about
consciousness can’t be derived from the fundamental physical properties
we already have, like space and time and mass and charge, then
the consistent thing to say is, ‘OK, then consciousness isn’t to be
reduced. It’s irreducible. It’s fundamental. It’s a basic feature of the
world.’.....
David Chalmers
Σάββατο 2 Ιανουαρίου 2010
Παρασκευή 1 Ιανουαρίου 2010
Quotes 2
A notion of probability that remains fuzzy throughout, as it needs to be,since such fuzziness is the very nature of uncertainty. Probability is a liberal art; it is a child of skepticism, not a tool for people with calculators on their belts to satisfy their desire to produce fancy calculations and certainties.
We humans are the victims of an asymmetry in the perception of random events. We attribute our successes to our skills, and our failures to external events outside our control, namely to randomness. We feel responsible for the good stuff, but not for the bad. This causes us to think that we are better than others at whatever we do for a living. Ninety-four percent of Swedes believe that their driving skills put them in the top 50 percent of Swedish drivers; 84 percent of Frenchmen feel that their lovemaking abilities put them in the top half of french lovers.
Nassim Nicholas Taleb.
Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
We humans are the victims of an asymmetry in the perception of random events. We attribute our successes to our skills, and our failures to external events outside our control, namely to randomness. We feel responsible for the good stuff, but not for the bad. This causes us to think that we are better than others at whatever we do for a living. Ninety-four percent of Swedes believe that their driving skills put them in the top 50 percent of Swedish drivers; 84 percent of Frenchmen feel that their lovemaking abilities put them in the top half of french lovers.
Nassim Nicholas Taleb.
Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Nassim Nicholas Taleb - The Black Swan 2
We live in a society where the reward mechanism is based on the illusion of the regular;our hormonal reward system also needs tangible and steady results. It too thinks that the world is steady and well behaved-it falls for the confirmation error. The world has changed too fast for our genetic makeup. We are alienated from our environment.
Our intuitions are not cut out for nonlinearities. Consider our life in a primitive environment where process and result are closely connected.
These nonlinear relationships are ubiquitous in life. Linear relationships are truly the exception; we only focus on them in classrooms and textbooks because they are easier to understand. Yesterday afternoon i tried to take a fresh look around me to catalog what i could see during day that was linear. I could not find anything, no more than someone hunting for squares or triangles could find them in the rain forest or, any more than someone looking for bell-shape randomness finding it in socioeconomic phenomena.
I will repeat that linear progression, a Platonic idea, is not the norm.
[Silent evidence is the cemetery of failed investors or actors etc. This population is very large and never taking into consideration when we think of the "success" of the survivors. We think that they are gifted "superstars" when they are more lucky Casanovas. Silent evidence is also criminals who are not caught, species that vanished without fossils or [lottery losers]].
Clearly there is an element of surviving Casanovas in us, that of the risk-taking genes, which encourages us to take blind risks, unaware of the variability of possible outcomes. We inherited the taste for uncalculated risk taking.
The reference point argument is as follows: Do not compute odds from the vantage point of the winning gambler (or the lucky Casanova, or the endlessly bouncing back New York, or the invincible Carthage), but from all those who started in the cohort. Consider once again the the example of the gambler. If you look at the population of beginning gamblers taken as a whole, you can be close to certain that one of them (but you do not know in advance which one) will show stellar results just by luck. So, from the reference point of the beginning cohort, this is not a big deal. But from the reference point of the winner (and, who does not, and this is key, take the losers into account), a long string of wins will appear to be to extraordinary an occurrence to be explain by luck. [Human species and anthropic principal or Int.Design malakies]......Why didn't the bubonic plague kill more people? People will supply quantities of cosmetic explanations involving theories about the intensity of the plague and "scientific models" of epidemics. Now try the weakened causality argument that i have just emphasized in this chapter: had the bubonic plague killed more people, the observers (us) would not be here to observe. So it may not necessarily be the property of diseases to spare us humans. Whenever your survival is in play, don't immediately look for causes and effects. The main identifiable reason for our survival of such diseases might simply be inaccessible to us: we are here since, Casanova-style, the "rosy" scenario played out, and if it seems too hard to understand it is because we are too brainwashed by notions of causality and we think that it is smarter to say BECAUSE than to accept randomness.
What is ludic fallacy? Ludic comes from ludus, Latin for games.
In the casino you know the rules, you can calculate the odds, and the type of uncertainty we encounter there is MILD, belonging to Mediocristan. My prepared statement was this: " The casino is the only human venture i know where the probabilities are known, Gaussian (i.e. bell-curve), and almost computable". You cannot expect the casino to pay out a million times your bet, or to change the rules abruptly on you during the game...In real life you do not know the odds; you need to discover them, and the sources of uncertainty are not defined......
Furthermore,just as we tend to underestimate the role of luck in life in general, we tend to overestimate it in games of chance.
"The casino is inside the Platonic fold; life stands outside of it.
A notion of probability that remains fuzzy throughout, as it needs to be,since such fuzziness is the very nature of uncertainty. Probability is a liberal art; it is a child of skepticism, not a tool for people with calculators on their belts to satisfy their desire to produce fancy calculations and certainties.
We humans are the victims of an asymmetry in the perception of random events. We attribute our successes to our skills, and our failures to external events outside our control, namely to randomness. We feel responsible for the good stuff, but not for the bad. This causes us to think that we are better than others at whatever we do for a living. Ninety-four percent of Swedes believe that their driving skills put them in the top 50 percent of Swedish drivers; 84 percent of Frenchmen feel that their lovemaking abilities put them in the top half of french lovers.
Our intuitions are not cut out for nonlinearities. Consider our life in a primitive environment where process and result are closely connected.
These nonlinear relationships are ubiquitous in life. Linear relationships are truly the exception; we only focus on them in classrooms and textbooks because they are easier to understand. Yesterday afternoon i tried to take a fresh look around me to catalog what i could see during day that was linear. I could not find anything, no more than someone hunting for squares or triangles could find them in the rain forest or, any more than someone looking for bell-shape randomness finding it in socioeconomic phenomena.
I will repeat that linear progression, a Platonic idea, is not the norm.
[Silent evidence is the cemetery of failed investors or actors etc. This population is very large and never taking into consideration when we think of the "success" of the survivors. We think that they are gifted "superstars" when they are more lucky Casanovas. Silent evidence is also criminals who are not caught, species that vanished without fossils or [lottery losers]].
Clearly there is an element of surviving Casanovas in us, that of the risk-taking genes, which encourages us to take blind risks, unaware of the variability of possible outcomes. We inherited the taste for uncalculated risk taking.
The reference point argument is as follows: Do not compute odds from the vantage point of the winning gambler (or the lucky Casanova, or the endlessly bouncing back New York, or the invincible Carthage), but from all those who started in the cohort. Consider once again the the example of the gambler. If you look at the population of beginning gamblers taken as a whole, you can be close to certain that one of them (but you do not know in advance which one) will show stellar results just by luck. So, from the reference point of the beginning cohort, this is not a big deal. But from the reference point of the winner (and, who does not, and this is key, take the losers into account), a long string of wins will appear to be to extraordinary an occurrence to be explain by luck. [Human species and anthropic principal or Int.Design malakies]......Why didn't the bubonic plague kill more people? People will supply quantities of cosmetic explanations involving theories about the intensity of the plague and "scientific models" of epidemics. Now try the weakened causality argument that i have just emphasized in this chapter: had the bubonic plague killed more people, the observers (us) would not be here to observe. So it may not necessarily be the property of diseases to spare us humans. Whenever your survival is in play, don't immediately look for causes and effects. The main identifiable reason for our survival of such diseases might simply be inaccessible to us: we are here since, Casanova-style, the "rosy" scenario played out, and if it seems too hard to understand it is because we are too brainwashed by notions of causality and we think that it is smarter to say BECAUSE than to accept randomness.
What is ludic fallacy? Ludic comes from ludus, Latin for games.
In the casino you know the rules, you can calculate the odds, and the type of uncertainty we encounter there is MILD, belonging to Mediocristan. My prepared statement was this: " The casino is the only human venture i know where the probabilities are known, Gaussian (i.e. bell-curve), and almost computable". You cannot expect the casino to pay out a million times your bet, or to change the rules abruptly on you during the game...In real life you do not know the odds; you need to discover them, and the sources of uncertainty are not defined......
Furthermore,just as we tend to underestimate the role of luck in life in general, we tend to overestimate it in games of chance.
"The casino is inside the Platonic fold; life stands outside of it.
A notion of probability that remains fuzzy throughout, as it needs to be,since such fuzziness is the very nature of uncertainty. Probability is a liberal art; it is a child of skepticism, not a tool for people with calculators on their belts to satisfy their desire to produce fancy calculations and certainties.
We humans are the victims of an asymmetry in the perception of random events. We attribute our successes to our skills, and our failures to external events outside our control, namely to randomness. We feel responsible for the good stuff, but not for the bad. This causes us to think that we are better than others at whatever we do for a living. Ninety-four percent of Swedes believe that their driving skills put them in the top 50 percent of Swedish drivers; 84 percent of Frenchmen feel that their lovemaking abilities put them in the top half of french lovers.
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