[crabkin]

Relevant video. I agree with your observations I think they are pretty interesting. Chomsky has an interesting bit here about how the epistemic implications of statistical models like these imply a shift in our values apropos to science and it's aims. For instance, as I understand it he communicates how before we would have considered some theory that made an accurate predictions as satisfying some standard of validity, now it seems people are aiming to see who can simulate the whole thing to the highest precision even if they do it black box style. I also like seeing Steven Pinker squirm a bit, so here's the vid.

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92GOS1VIGxY&t=10s

[voidhorse]

Totally, I think one of the major dynamics of our age has been a general shift toward a new "epistemic regime" in which the vast majority of "truth making" procedures have become statistical in nature. If you look at history, we tend to move through different dominant modes of reasoning about the world: deduction, induction....I think our particular contemporary experience is one in which the new dominant mode of reasoning about everything is statistical and probabilistic. In many areas it's a boon, in others it's tragic. (the statistical treatment of human beings is one obvious case; trying to orient education psychological problems according to what the mean demands pretty much ensures everyone loses (gold star students lose out on opportunities, less gifted students start to get some help, but not nearly the case-based, customized help they really ought to)