Metaphysical objectivism

The theory that therean underlying reality that exists independentour perceptionconsciousness. Thisin contrastmetaphysical subjectivism.

Objectivismprobability

In probability, Objectivism isbelief that probabilitiesreal: they're not just numbers we make up or guess, but havereal significance. For example, suppose you flipcoin without looking at it,then coverwithpiecepaper. Many would say that although there is50% chance that iteither heads or tails, neverthelesscoinactually either one orother. An objectivist would instead say thatcoin itself hasprobability50%being heads or tails, regardlesswhether anyonethinking aboutsubject.

Objectivism comes unstuck when two people have differing probability estimates forsame thing. For example, suppose youatparty wherehost has scribbled eitherzero orone on everyone's forehead,thereno mirrors. Now considerquestionwhatprobabilitythat your forehead reads zero - an objectivist would say that iteither probability one or zero, whichother guests know - but that you haveestimate itbehalf. This can feel somewhat unwieldyunnatural.

One curious formula forprobability thatsun would rise was given by Laplace, an objectivist. He claimed that this probability was (d+1)/(d+2), where d isnumberdays thatsun has risen -that this formula appliedall cases where we knew nothing (or where what we did know was swamped by what we didn't). It's not entirely clear where he pulled this figure from, butdoes seemwork.