[DiscourseFan]

I think about these questions very often, but I don't feel like going on a long rant about it from a philosophical perspective. I will instead give an anecdote:

I think from my teens to my early 20s my political stance changed dramatically, and at any one point in time I would think that whatever I held to be true I would continue to in the future. But what always changed my belief system was not encountering some new piece of information that changed my idea or made me "update my priors" (in the crude Bayesian system, a most despicable philosophy of our era). It was always something that radically changed how it was that I understood the world around me, something that made my way of thinking about things shift so dramatically that I had to abandon my old ideas. I think everyone should read Marx, Nietzsche, and Freud for that reason, even if you think they are heinous and evil, because they radically question the logic and order of society and knowledge, and their writings are deeply disturbing to many for that reason.

What changes people's perspectives is generally what people want to avoid (to the author's point). And the more you want to avoid something or "prove it wrong," oftentimes the more it changes the way you think about the world.

[gestatingAI]

Interesting. May I ask why you consider Bayesian updates a “despicable philosophy” ?

> It was always something that radically changed how it was that I understood the world around me, something that made my way of thinking about things shift so dramatically that I had to abandon my old ideas.

If you have examples, I would much appreciate it, although I do not mean to pry.

[DiscourseFan]

>May I ask why you consider Bayesian updates a “despicable philosophy”?

For the reason I said in that quote: Bayesian updates require upholding the same structure and considering things in networks of pre-established probabilities. This is very useful for say sportsbetting, or the weather, but in ones day to day life, especially in political circumstances, things often happen that are completely unpredictable because the socially normative prediction algorithms are always set to re-enforce the normative operations of society, making any radical change inconceivably impossible.

>If you have examples, I would much appreciate it, although I do not mean to pry.

I moved towards the Left because it seemed to me that the basis of so called "reasonable" ideologies like libertarianism and general laissez-fare market conditions always held within them notions of "fairness" and that people would "get what they deserved." It seemed to me that this is language more appropriate for disciplining a child, than ordering our society. In a sense, what was conceived of as "rational" by those who supported the systems of power was revealed to me to be nothing more than ideology which justified that power.

[gestatingAI]

I understand now, thanks! You have identified a weakness of Bayesian thinking in daily life i.e. choosing the priors. Since infinite belief updates are not feasible in the real world, two Bayesian thinkers can have completely different beliefs based on their starting priors.