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Old 06-05-2020, 06:01 AM   #40
Nogrod
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Formendacil View Post
Basically, I agree that behaviour can be analyzed, but I disagree that it can be done scientifically in the absence of any context.
...
But during Day 1? It's darts on a dartboard for all a villager could see. You can't see any pattern during its first step.
I don't see why there would be only two options: being able to make scientific analysis or the whole thing being as good as nothing. Actually, I'd say, both of those options are fictious or non-existent. There is no way to make a scientific analysis with such an important part of data or evidence lacking, but neither is it never only just random darts on a dartboard.

I think we're stuck with what the great Númenorian philosophers called abductive reasoning or inference, where we start from observations and then reason for the most likely conclusion - in a good case the results are plausible enough to act on, but they will never verify our conclusions.

I think Form is correct in pointing out the lack of "baseline" - or generally lack of data on Day1, but I'd not deduce from that a total futility of Day1 - even on Day1 itself.

We'll have ample time to get the ball rolling toDay.


EDIT: X'd with a bunch
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