Lion, you seem to be changing the story here. It starts with TGG relaying an anecdote, about how his religious coworker is just AMAZED when he picks up an unfinished piece, right off, and thinks that is not natural. This anecdote was (In retrospect, hilariously) in response to a recommendation about not taking religious hyperbole seriously.
Anyway, to wit:
I'd bet most experiences of God aren't hallucinations. They can be as homely as what many would describe as "the warm fuzzies". An effusive feeling of love or wonder that makes one bubble over in a state of joy can be attributed to "the Holy Spirit moves me!" or "the love of Jesus fills my heart". There's no hallucination, just hyperbole. Then their misattribution of unusual states to God or Jesus becomes confirmation they're real.
Same with coincidences. Little "miracles" in life that would be best explained as fortunate coincidences turn into a proof of God's hand in things. A natural explanation feels (needlessly) like it takes the wonderfulness out of the coincidence. Since it's an experience that happened to a religious person, it becomes a "religious experience".
So, be aware of the likelihood of extreme hyperbole when they reference their religious experiences.
A former co-worker is a very religious person. We were performing a typical inspection on an order that contained 40 pieces, all identical. We would measure one piece and visually inspect the remaining pieces for completeness. He grabbed one piece and it was incomplete, but all the other pieces were complete. Only the first one he picked up had a dimension that was unfinished! This is very unusual.
He came to me in a state of amazement. He said, "What are the chances I would have picked up the one piece that was not finished? That's a million to one!! So I calmly said, the odds are forty to one because there are 40 pieces. Talk about a look of disappointment, knocked him right of miracle-witnessing-land.
So that’s the context. Religionists take little everyday coincidences and call them miracles from God. Hence the anecdote. A factory worker picks up a piece, and it is a defect.
But now, you hyperbolically (and right on cue for the christian) claim that the odds are even greater than one in a box because it happened to be at the top of the stack? And you have no idea if he took it from the top of the stack, by the way. It was only said that it was the first piece he picked up.
But here you go:
Is that really only 1 in 40?
I think you're overlooking the fact that there are a LOT more than 40 combinations of ways you can stack 40 widgets (think 40-sided rubics cube.) The defective part didn't have to be the very same one closest at hand.
Your co-worker wasn't blindfolded and randomly selecting one coloured ball from a bag of 40.
Oh? How do you know that. “It was the first one he picked up” is all you know
Skep explains it to you.
But the defective one could only be in one of forty places. How the remaining 39 were arranged with respect to it and each other is irrelevant.
But that's NOT the anecdote.
There is not an equal chance that the widget at the bottom of the stack and the one at the top of the stack will be picked first.
You do not even know they were stacked. For all you know, they WERE marbles, or they were 1” square widgets in a foot-wide box. Nor do you know if they were stacked in order from the edge finishing line.
Their placement is random. So that doesn't affect the probability that the defective one is in the chosen position.
For all we know, Bilby is correct here. They could indeed be random. And in the context of something boxed up, it is essentially random wich piece starts a new box in most production lines.
That's a different anecdote. (Whether the wigdets are arranged at random.)
Oh? How do you know that? How do you know that’s a different anecdote?
IF they are arranged randomly and IF the blindfolded co-worker selects one completely at random,
THEN all have an equal chance of being selected first.
You and Treedbear must surely understand how easy it would be to rig the scenario such that the defective widget will almost certainly be picked 1st. And that's the reason why you have to avoid mocking your religious co-worker"s belief telling them it's only ever 1 in 40
Dude, this is true, but it’s still not amazing.
And it completely contradicts your claim that it’s MORE amazing than pure chance. It’s LESS amazing. So the million to one mocking - well, no one should mock their co-worker, but it remains an illustration of willful ignorance, doesn’t it?
Sure, it could be rigged.
But if it is, the odds are better than 40:1, and if it's not, they're exactly 40:1. In no scenario are the odds worse than 40:1, as you have been claiming.
Exactly. The only way is coould be worse odds is the trickster god I reference below. And if your credulous gullibility relies on a trickster god, then you have really weird beliefs.
They are picking the one closest at hand.
Again, you do not know that. You only know it was the first he picked up. He could have reached across he box and gotten one from the back.
Hence the widgets closest at hand have a better chance of being picked.
AND we have no background information stating that the 40 widgets are randomly arranged.
So it's not a simple 1 in 40 chance.
On a production line, it really is.
If God wanted to send a miraculous sign to the co-worker by way of letting them pick the defective widget 1st go, then He could place the defective one at the top of the stack and closest within reach.
That god, such a clear communicator. It’s said he can
design DNA!. But when it comes down to a demonstration, he moves widgets.
Are you kidding us here?
Finding the defective widget 1st pick or last pick are not equally probable if you know additional background information.
Indeed this is true, if you have assignable cause variation, you can certainly do some predictions. But it will never make it LESS probable than 1 in 40. Certainly not a million to one.
=======
Oh! You’re saying the odds are greater because you have a trickster god that likes to stack the deck against people. That’s the only way to change the odds.
*sigh*
No. That's not what I'm saying.
Look. Let me explain the concept of background information and how it relates to probability.
No need, dude. That’s what I do for a living.
(What do you do for a living?)
Anecdotal (religious) co-worker and his (smug condescending) atheist sidekick work in quality control. Each day/week/month they do a 100% inspection of a batch of 40 widgets that have just come off the production line.
They have to perform the QA inspection because the injection mold or mandrel or die or 'thingy' which makes the widgets gradually wears out such that the finished items towards the end of the production run are no longer within tolerance.
So 40 widgets come off the production line one by one down to the end of the conveyor where someone takes them one by one and stacks them on a pallet. (Hint do you see the background info yet?)
A hand truck trolly wheels the pallet over to the quality control department where the religious co-worker walks over and starts with the first widget - on the top, closest to reach. No they aren't blindfolded. And no they don't select a widget at the bottom of the stack. #not-a-game-of-Jenga
Now, since the widgets produced first are at the bottom of the stack (duh!) they don't have a 1 in 40 chance of being selected first. And because the widget that gets inspected first is the one closest at hand, it is NOT blind chance that they happen across the defective part 1st go.
So, when the religious co-worker expresses their surprise at such an unusual first pick discovery, they actually are onto something.
What, that the manufacturing process trends toward more defects as equipment wears making the last part made
more likely to be defective than any other part prior to it?
And (ironically) it's the smug, conceited 'uber-rational' Mr Spock atheist who is wrong to assert that it's only ever always forever going to be a 1 in 40 luck of the draw outcome.
1 in 40
or better
