Principle of Indifference

The principle of indifference (also called principle of insufficient reason) is a rule for assigning epistemic probabilities. Suppose that there are n > 1 mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive possibilities. The principle of indifference states that if the n possibilities are indistinguishable except for their names, then each possibility should be assigned a probability equal to 1/n.

In Bayesian probability, this is the simplest non-informative prior. The principle of indifference is meaningless under the frequency interpretation of probability, in which probabilities are relative frequencies rather than degrees of belief in uncertain propositions, conditional upon a state of information.

Read more about Principle Of Indifference:  Examples, Application To Continuous Variables, History of The Principle of Indifference

Famous quotes containing the words principle of and/or principle:

    Look through the whole history of countries professing the Romish religion, and you will uniformly find the leaven of this besetting and accursed principle of action—that the end will sanction any means.
    Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834)

    The first principle of a free society is an untrammeled flow of words in an open forum.
    Adlai Stevenson (1900–1965)