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I understand the problem of probability pretty well, I think -- as both somebody who's worked fairly closely with folks who were doing probability modeling, and as a recent heart attack survivor. I mention the latter because I am getting a deep appreciation of what I am doing to get the best outcomes. I am being engaged in my own health, doing everything some decent cardiologists are saying to do, trying to be in tune with what angina is "stable" and what needs nitro, always calling when I use the nitro, becoming a new man regarding diet, immediate cold turkey smoking cessation a couple months ago (when I returned from hospital...) and guess what? It's all probability. I am acutely aware, no pun intended, that I've now got cardiac artery disease, which is a label they slap on you once you get a stent (actually, once blockage is such that you have needed a stent). I have drugs I MUST take. What has changed for me to suddenly acquire the disease? Nothing really. It was already there; it is now diagnosed (and treated, a few ways). But my risk category has changed via diagnosis. The reality is that I am addressing probabilities with different behavior. I still might die of what I have, and I might die with what I have. I might have 50 years left (a very unlikely outcome, even if I'm in perfect health.) I might have 5 minutes left, God forbid, whether we invoke some natural cause (specifically, whether or not we invoke a CAD-related outcome), or whether we invoke the infamous "get hit by a bus" scenario. (Since I do not intend to catch a bus in the next 5 minutes, we can substitute a building collapse, etc.)
PFNVA GOLD Certified.
The key is, until the event transpires or is well on the way to transpiring, I have zero clue as to what outcome will transpire. Similarly, I have (and will have) no idea about the efficacy of my lifestyle changes.
I am 57, and my father died of a massive heart attack at 60. I don't recall when he had his first heart attack, but about my age sounds right. The big differences: He had a totally different heart condition, a thickening of the septum. Stents did not exist, but they would not have helped that condition. He was civilian support for Navy, and his condition was relatively rare, so we ended up in NIH a lot with him. I remember vaguely the wonder with which angioplasty was described ("They just blow up a balloon in your artery, and they push all the blockage to the sides...") (The stent, invented shortly thereafter, holds the artery open.)
So I have a narrative in my head that I can stand back from and evaluate. It includes a certain epistemic arrogance-check: We remain ignorant about hearts and arteries, as measured by developments 40 years from now. My poor father had open heart surgery - he got slit stem to stern as it were. I have a little hole-shaped scar, and it is fading. It's not even near the femoral artery - they went in through my wrist. Again, different conditions, different procedures. I'm not even sure a man who had my kind of heart attack HAD an option, short of a bypass, 40 years ago. So my poor old dad? That would have been me, maybe. Who knows.
What I'm getting at is, my Dad's experience in this extended metaphor can be compared to one of those Giants super bowls, or really any other season when we get a catastrophic outcome. It colors my perception; it allows my to finally take my risk factors very seriously. If I fall along the main sequence of outcomes, my lifestyle changes will have some effect on my future outcomes. My behavior pre-M.I. can be compared with JETE team management, that is, I did what felt good at the time with no perceptible understanding that improving one's odds of success most likely will result in improvement, in any given season.
So yes, "most likely" is your friend. Yes, one should take the steps most likely to result in the positive outcomes. One can even do this when it looks as if the negative outcome is far away.
But conflating the commoditization of risk via a gambling market, with the real outcomes, reeks of epistemic arrogance. It's confusing the map with the territory--and that way lies madness.
All models are only models, hence "it is what it is."
We are on a knife's edge, as is any franchise, any season--that is the reality of risk, and risk is a reality of life.
Sorry to put my own stuff out there so prominently in this reply. Thoughts about probability versus real outcomes have been foremost in my mind for years (whether in contexts like this, in macroeconomic contexts, or as regards interpretations of quantum physics, which is a source of fascination for me lately, at a lay level).
I know, long rambling post. Your point of entry, and it appears others share it, is the world of gambling -- again, the commoditization of the probability we're discussing. Then there are "experts."
But any given outcome is binary: ultimately, we can think about the Pats winning, or not winning, the SB. In the very short term, the Pats will or will not beat the JETE (and covering the spread is irrelevant). In the main, it does not matter what you win by (this is to disregard playoff tiebreaker scenarios.) It is absolutely incorrect to ever say "9 out of 10 times, the Patriots win that game." (Or the equivalent for any other team or game.)
The reality is, 1 out 1 time, the Patriots win/lose any given game.
So this outlook isn't very helpful if the goal is to "talk football" by way of having opinions about probability. The problem is that any level of expertise can be gainsaid by the result of any given game.
Again, "most likely" is our friend... but only up to a point. I "don't think we will win it all this year." I fear that Brady is declining and the decline might be - might be - becoming steep. All these inklings will play into the euphoria or at least relief of more positive outcomes... I can back them up by quoting extant stats, etc. Maybe I can write it up well and somebody can say I'm an "expert." They'd be wrong, of course.
The above view, paradoxically, adds to my enjoyment of the game. It's a realization that all the teams and all the players are getting paid, and are busting their ass to win... and that the result of the next play is unwritten. Wouldn't that be a reason to watch a bit more intently?
You may have heart concerns but you have one damn fine mind.
The key is, until the event transpires or is well on the way to transpiring, I have zero clue as to what outcome will transpire. Similarly, I have (and will have) no idea about the efficacy of my lifestyle changes.
I am 57, and my father died of a massive heart attack at 60. I don't recall when he had his first heart attack, but about my age sounds right. The big differences: He had a totally different heart condition, a thickening of the septum. Stents did not exist, but they would not have helped that condition. He was civilian support for Navy, and his condition was relatively rare, so we ended up in NIH a lot with him. I remember vaguely the wonder with which angioplasty was described ("They just blow up a balloon in your artery, and they push all the blockage to the sides...") (The stent, invented shortly thereafter, holds the artery open.)
So I have a narrative in my head that I can stand back from and evaluate. It includes a certain epistemic arrogance-check: We remain ignorant about hearts and arteries, as measured by developments 40 years from now. My poor father had open heart surgery - he got slit stem to stern as it were. I have a little hole-shaped scar, and it is fading. It's not even near the femoral artery - they went in through my wrist. Again, different conditions, different procedures. I'm not even sure a man who had my kind of heart attack HAD an option, short of a bypass, 40 years ago. So my poor old dad? That would have been me, maybe. Who knows.
What I'm getting at is, my Dad's experience in this extended metaphor can be compared to one of those Giants super bowls, or really any other season when we get a catastrophic outcome. It colors my perception; it allows my to finally take my risk factors very seriously. If I fall along the main sequence of outcomes, my lifestyle changes will have some effect on my future outcomes. My behavior pre-M.I. can be compared with JETE team management, that is, I did what felt good at the time with no perceptible understanding that improving one's odds of success most likely will result in improvement, in any given season.
So yes, "most likely" is your friend. Yes, one should take the steps most likely to result in the positive outcomes. One can even do this when it looks as if the negative outcome is far away.
But conflating the commoditization of risk via a gambling market, with the real outcomes, reeks of epistemic arrogance. It's confusing the map with the territory--and that way lies madness.
All models are only models, hence "it is what it is."
We are on a knife's edge, as is any franchise, any season--that is the reality of risk, and risk is a reality of life.
Sorry to put my own stuff out there so prominently in this reply. Thoughts about probability versus real outcomes have been foremost in my mind for years (whether in contexts like this, in macroeconomic contexts, or as regards interpretations of quantum physics, which is a source of fascination for me lately, at a lay level).
I know, long rambling post. Your point of entry, and it appears others share it, is the world of gambling -- again, the commoditization of the probability we're discussing. Then there are "experts."
But any given outcome is binary: ultimately, we can think about the Pats winning, or not winning, the SB. In the very short term, the Pats will or will not beat the JETE (and covering the spread is irrelevant). In the main, it does not matter what you win by (this is to disregard playoff tiebreaker scenarios.) It is absolutely incorrect to ever say "9 out of 10 times, the Patriots win that game." (Or the equivalent for any other team or game.)
The reality is, 1 out 1 time, the Patriots win/lose any given game.
So this outlook isn't very helpful if the goal is to "talk football" by way of having opinions about probability. The problem is that any level of expertise can be gainsaid by the result of any given game.
Again, "most likely" is our friend... but only up to a point. I "don't think we will win it all this year." I fear that Brady is declining and the decline might be - might be - becoming steep. All these inklings will play into the euphoria or at least relief of more positive outcomes... I can back them up by quoting extant stats, etc. Maybe I can write it up well and somebody can say I'm an "expert." They'd be wrong, of course.
The above view, paradoxically, adds to my enjoyment of the game. It's a realization that all the teams and all the players are getting paid, and are busting their ass to win... and that the result of the next play is unwritten. Wouldn't that be a reason to watch a bit more intently?
