mental diagnosis

[BMAD]

Man goes to see a psychiatrist. Upon sitting on the couch the psychiatrist explains that from his acute observation skills he was able to narrow down the man's issues to one of two issues:

You are either inconsistent or conceited. Since the human brain is finite, there are a finite number of propositions p 1 p n that you believe. But unless you are conceited, you know that you sometimes make mistakes, and that not everything you believe is true. Therefore, if you are not conceited, you know that at least some of the p are false. Yet you believe each of the p. individually.

So what was the man's diagnoses?

[DeGe]

If I took this reasoning to the doctor instead, then either he is inconsistent or conceited as he would have the same "diagnosis" of believing and making mistakes...

I would therefore advise the man to leave the psychiatrist's clinic. The man is alright, he's just human!

[vinay.singh84]

The doctor's anaylsis is flawed, in that it assumes absolute probabiltiy, when, in truth, people believe propositions with subjective probability.

[bonanova]

The patient is an experimentalist, neither conceited nor inconsistent.

Life is an experiment. Experience yields data. Analysis yields propositions and theories.

Life yields more data, and analysis modifies the theories, which are held (believed) subject to more experience.

And experimentalist can be both consistent and humble.