When someone says “wow there was only a 30% chance of that happening!” But wouldn’t it be 100% because it DID happen and due to an (probably) infinite amount of unseen variables? In this way would this mean the universe is deterministic?
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I’m going to skip over “the universe is deterministic” because as far as I’m concerned it’s impossible to prove either way: we could be living in a simulation for all we know. What I can say is even if it is deterministic it’s impossible for us to understand how, so it might as well be random.
In terms of past events probabilities, I think the easiest way to compare is to consider a coin flip. You flip once, it’s tails. That was 50:50. So does that mean the next flip is guaranteed heads? Obviously not, it’s still 50:50.
Just because something happened doesn’t mean it was lways guaranteed. There were a large number of unknown variables at play which we simply have no way of understanding. Depending on who you ask at a (sub?) Atomic level it may even be truly random and influencing the coin flip.
The probability of you being dead in 2030 is not the same as you being dead in 2030 given that you died in 2029.
When you add more information the probabilities change.
For example, the probability of flipping heads twice in a row is 25%, but after you toss the coin once the probability changes to 0% (if you got tails) or 50% (if you got heads).
The probability of you being dead in 2030 is not the same as you being dead in 2030 given that you died in 2029.
When you add more information the probabilities change.
For example, the probability of flipping heads twice in a row is 25%, but after you toss the coin once the probability changes to 0% (if you got tails) or 50% (if you got heads).
The probability of you being dead in 2030 is not the same as you being dead in 2030 given that you died in 2029.
When you add more information the probabilities change.
For example, the probability of flipping heads twice in a row is 25%, but after you toss the coin once the probability changes to 0% (if you got tails) or 50% (if you got heads).
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