Posted: Feb 08, 2012 1:45 pm
Mus Ponticus wrote:
For example, if a historian rebuts an opponent by saying his theory is “implausible,” what exactly does that mean? How does he arrive at that conclusion? How can we critique or check whether that conclusion is valid, when we don’t even know what premises it was based on, or by what logic the conclusion is being reached from those premises? And indeed, are all implausible explanations false? If not, then calling an explanation “implausible” is not a sufficient rebuttal. Whereas if all implausible explanations are false, then why? And how do we know when something is that implausible?
Bayes’ Theorem forces historians to confess what probabilities they are estimating for what things, and why they are coming to those estimates instead of others. Their assumptions are thus exposed. And once exposed, often they won’t stand up to criticism. Or if they do, then we will have ended up with a much more robust proof of their conclusion. Either way, we end up with better history.
In some ways I can see his point, and I think it could be an interesting exercise. However (and I'm aware I'm about to compare apples ands pears here) I would feel a certain amount of unease similar to using the criterion of embarrassment, in that ultimately I'm not sure how much weight to give the analysis. I haven't (yet) read anything to suggest I should give it a lot, though to be fair, I haven't studied it extensively.