I do not know
enough philosophy to know how to label ideas and concepts properly. I’m much more interested in testing ideas
than labeling them. I love science and I
like to learn new things, but I’m not all that excited to discover more
knowledge for the sake of knowledge. I
am, at heart, very practical. Thus I
think that if there is any term that describes my way of thinking it is this: “an
engineer”. I don’t suppose “engineering”
can be considered a philosophy, but for me, it is about as close to a
description of my way of thinking as I can get.
I think things through to decide what I should do today. I want a practical outcome from my
thoughts. I’ll bet you won’t even find
the word “engineer” or “engineering” in any textbook on philosophy. Well, that’s a shame in my opinion!
In light of
that, I thought that today I would give you what I imagine as the first chapter
of a book about “testing the non-material world” that I would love to
write. Someday... I’m guessing it’ll more likely show up as
pieces in this blog over time. But,
without further ado…here is Chapter 1.
Chapter 1 – Open Your
Mind to Experimentation[1]
What if you
were standing before those proverbial pearly gates and you find yourself
presented with…not one, not two, but three
identical pearly gates. As you
contemplate your next move, a voice from above says “Behind one of those gates is
everything you could wish for. Choose
it, and it is yours. But be careful –
behind the other two gates is darkness and pain!”
Well, after
some significant consternation, during which time you think to yourself that “this
is certainly not how I heard it would be”, you realize you need to make a
choice. Each gate is identical. There is nothing to give you any further
information. So, you say to yourself
“it’s a one in three chance” and you point to the middle gate.
Now the voice
from above says “You have selected the middle gate. Let me show you what is behind the gate on
the right.” The right gate opens and
inside you see that it is, indeed, dark and frightening. You look away, thankful you didn’t pick that
one.
Then the
voice asks you a question you didn’t expect.
“Would you like to change your pick?
Would you like to switch to the left gate instead of the middle gate?”
After you
think again “this is definitely not
how I heard it would be”, you consider whether you can read anything into this
option. Is the voice “good” and trying
to get you to change, knowing that you’ve picked the wrong gate? Or is the voice trying to trick you into
changing your pick, knowing you’ve picked the correct gate? After some consternation, you realize that
there is nothing in what the voice has told you to give you any clue. Fundamentally, you are on your own here, with
nothing to aid you in making a decision except the pure odds of the selection. So now you are kind of back where you were at
the start, except that now the odds are a little better. There are just two gates now. This is nerve racking.
So you
ponder…what’s the point of switching your choice? You have no idea which gate is which, so why
change? Your odds are 50:50 either way,
so you say “I’ll stick with the middle gate.”
Not
good. What if I told you that you just
make a huge mistake? What if I told you
that your odds were not 50:50? What if I told you that you were twice as likely to choose the correct gate
by switching your choice?
You may say
“Obviously the odds are 50:50, and it makes no difference which gate I
pick. There are two gates – one with the
prize and one without – so how can the odds be anything other than 50:50? Only an
idiot would think otherwise!”[2]
That’s exactly what I said the
first time I heard this problem. I was convinced
that it makes no difference whether you change your selection or not. How could it possibly be any other way?
At this point
in your reading of this Introduction, you can do one of two things. You can say to yourself “I know statistics –
I’m not an idiot. This is a simple
probability problem. It is what it is.”
And you can close this book and not think about it again.
Alternatively
you could, maybe out of a certain amount of indignation or just simple
curiosity, say “let’s try it and see.”
Which group
are you in? This book is written for
those who are willing to try it and see, no matter how strongly they are
convinced that the odds are 50:50. When
someone who seems to be sincere and reasonable makes the claim that I have made
– the claim that you are actually twice as likely to choose the right gate if
you change your original selection – you are willing to put it to the
test. You’re convinced that the outcome
will show that the odds are 50:50. You’d
put money on it. But you’re still
willing to try it out. This book is for
you.
Of course,
this book is not about selecting the right gate. It’s not about statistics. I have no interest in trying to mislead you
about my purposes. Here is what I’m
hoping to accomplish with this book: I’m
hoping that some of you – those who have totally rejected the claims of any and
all non-materialist viewpoints – will be willing to put your claims to the
test. And I don’t mean a mental
exercise. I don’t mean arguing
logic. I mean really put them to the test.
I’m talking about conducting an experiment. By the end of this book, here is my
goal: that you will have designed your
own experiment to test a variety of spiritual beliefs, and that you will be
ready to start conducting that experiment.
So, if you
are in the first group – if you know already that no amount of evidence could
ever convince you otherwise regarding any other view of reality than the one
you have now – well, you ought to put this down and read another book. Go read
some good fiction! This book is not
for you.
If you’re
still reading, then don’t say I didn’t tell you up front!
And what
about the problem with the gates? Well –
try it. Do an experiment. It’s easy enough to do. Get a friend to help you. Get three cards – say an ace of spades and
the two red deuces. It would be helpful
if you got a piece of wood with a slot in it so that you could set the cards
upright. Then you sit on one side of the
cards with the cards facing away from you, and have your friend sit on the
other side. Have him place the three
cards in random order in the slots. You
pick one. Then, have your friend remove
one of the two remaining cards – but never removing the ace of spades. Then, keep your original choice and write
down whether you selected the ace of spades or not. Do this 100 times. Then, change your strategy and always change
your mind after the first card is removed.
Write down whether you selected the ace of spades in this scenario. Do this one 100 times. Compare the results. Do you win about twice as often with the
second scenario – when you change your mind – than you do with the first? If so, you might still be unconvinced. Too small of a sample you will say. Well, that is easy to remedy. Repeat the test, only do it 1,000 times. Or 10,000.
Whatever it takes. At some point
the evidence will become overwhelming to you.
It is at that point that you might be willing to consider that the odds
really are not 50:50. At that point, you
are ready to consider additional logical arguments.
Why isn’t it
50:50? If you haven’t tried it, go try
it first. Then you can read this paragraph. Actually, I will simply talk you through this
by describing experiments where the results may be more obvious to you. Let me start with an extreme example and work
backwards. Let’s use the entire deck of
52 cards this time. So let’s imagine a scenario
where all 52 cards are spread out in front of you, facing away where you can
only see the backs. The goal is to pick
the ace of spades. So, you pick one of
the 52 at random. Then, your friend
removes one of the remaining cards (but not the ace of spades) and you decide
whether to change your original pick or not.
Now let’s change the game up just a bit.
Let’s say that your friend keeps removing one of the non-ace of spades
after each round. And let’s say that you
stay with your original card while the other cards are being removed. Finally, you get down to the very end where
there are only two cards left. Your
friend has removed 50 cards, none of them the ace of spades. Should you switch? Consider this. When you first picked the one card out of 52,
what were the odds that it was the ace of spades? It was 1 in 52. Not very good at all. What were the odds that the ace of spades was
part of the remaining 51 cards that you didn’t
select? 51 in 52. Very good odds. Do you see where this leaves you? Think of it this way: if, instead of stopping to ask you if you
wanted to change your mind after each selection, your friend simply removed 50
of the remaining 51 cards after you made your first pick. All 50 are known to be non-ace of spades (let’s
assume you picked a trustworthy friend).
Now there is just one card remaining of the original 51. What are the odds that the last remaining card
is the ace of spades? 51:52. And what are the odds that the card you
originally picked is the ace of spades
1:52. In fact, in this case, if
you switched cards at the end, you would almost always win, and if you kept your original card, you would almost always lose.
If you can
see that the situation with all 52 cards clearly and logically shows that you
should change your selection at the end, then let’s work backwards from that
point. What if the deck only had 10
cards? Now there would be a 1:10 chance
that your original choice was the ace of spades and a 9:10 chance that the
remaining card is the ace of spades.
You’d win 9 times as often if you always changed your choice at the
end. Well, what if there are 4
cards? Its 3:4 vs. 1:4, so you’re three
times as likely.
And that
takes us back to where we started. Three
gates. You select one. The odds are 1:3 that you picked the right gate. On that we can all agree. And, the odds are 2:3 that the right gate is
one of the two remaining. The wrong gate
is removed from those two. So, the odds
are 1:3 that you picked the right gate first, making the odds 2:3 that the
remaining gate holds the prize. And,
therefore, you find that you are twice as likely to win if you change your
mind.
By the way,
when people are presented with this situation in real life, they almost always
keep their original choice. “Go with
your gut.” “Your first inclination is
often the best.” Or, simply “it doesn’t
matter – it’s 50:50 either way – so I’ll stick with my original choice.” Isn’t that interesting? I find it to be quite fascinating.
I wonder if Monty Hall knew that?
[1]
I’m talking about “putting things to the test”, not “experimentation” as you
might have used that term in the 60’s!
[2]
If you heard this problem before, then you might have already been convinced
that you should switch your choice. But
put yourself in the mindset you had the first time you heard this problem
presented.
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