<div style="margin: 12px 0px; font-family: arial; color: #333333; background: #ffffff; border: solid 4px #e5e5e5; width: 100%; clear: left;"><div class="CM_CTB_Content_Wrap" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;background-color: #ffffff;"><div style="border-bottom: solid 1px #dcdcdc; white-space: nowrap; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: #eeeeee ;background-image: url(http://clipmarks.com/images/source-bg.gif); background-repeat: repeat-x; height: 24px; line-height: 24px; vertical-align: middle; padding-bottom: 4px; color: #666666; font-size: 10px;" ><a href="http://clipmarks.com/clip-to-blog/" title="see clips that are hot right now"><img src="http://content.clipmarks.com/blog_embed/b860d2f2-b397-421c-ab6a-67e30a7be074/5FE429A3-7BEE-4459-967C-4071B4F1DBE2/" alt="" width="19" height="19" border="0" style="vertical-align: middle; margin: 0px 4px; display: inline; border: none; float:none;" /></a>clipped from <a title="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Doomsday_argument&oldid=304054109" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Doomsday_argument&oldid=304054109" style="font-size: 11px;">en.wikipedia.org</a></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Doomsday_argument&oldid=304054109"><div align="center"><img src="http://content6.clipmarks.com/blog_cache/en.wikipedia.org/img/4D88DE74-9484-425E-AA99-4EDCF3B1841D" alt="" /></div></blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Doomsday_argument&oldid=304054109"><DIV class="thumbcaption"> <DIV class="magnify"><A title="Enlarge" class="internal" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Population_curve.svg" linkindex="10"><IMG width="15" height="11" alt="" src="http://en.wikipedia.org/skins-1.5/common/images/magnify-clip.png" /></A></DIV> World population from <A class="mw-redirect" title="Prehistoric times" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prehistoric_times" linkindex="11">10,000 BC</A> to <A title="2000" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2000" linkindex="12">AD 2000</A></DIV></blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Doomsday_argument&oldid=304054109"><P>The <B>Doomsday argument</B> (<B>DA</B>) is a <A title="Probabilistic argument" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Probabilistic_argument" linkindex="13">probabilistic argument</A> that claims to <A class="mw-redirect" title="Predict" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predict" linkindex="14">predict</A> the <A title="Future" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future" linkindex="15">future</A> lifetime of the <A class="mw-redirect" title="Human species" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_species" linkindex="16">human species</A> given only an estimate of the total number of humans born so far. Simply put, it says that supposing the humans alive today are in a random place in the whole human history timeline, chances are we are about halfway through it.</P></blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Doomsday_argument&oldid=304054109"><DD><IMG src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/math/0/4/c/04c2caa4eb3773b53d354273f540b4e7.png" alt="P(N \leq Z) = \int_{N=n}^{N=Z} P(N|n)\,dN" class="tex" /> <IMG src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/math/4/6/8/4680067972b14340dd714587f39d3db1.png" alt=" = \frac{Z-n}{Z}" class="tex" /></DD></blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Doomsday_argument&oldid=304054109"><P>The <A class="mw-redirect" title="Doomsday clock" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doomsday_clock" linkindex="114">Doomsday clock</A> shows the expected time to nuclear <A title="Doomsday event" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doomsday_event" linkindex="115">doomsday</A> by the judgment of an <A title="Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulletin_of_the_Atomic_Scientists" linkindex="116">expert board</A>, rather than a Bayesian model. If the twelve hours of the clock symbolize the lifespan of the human species, its current time of 11:55 implies that we are among the last 1% of people who will ever be born (i.e. that <I>n</I> &gt; 0.99<I>N</I>). <A title="J. Richard Gott" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._Richard_Gott" linkindex="117">J. Richard Gott</A>'s temporal version of the Doomsday argument (DA) would require very strong prior evidence to overcome the improbability of being born in such a <A title="Copernican principle" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copernican_principle" linkindex="118">special</A> time.</P></blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Doomsday_argument&oldid=304054109"><div align="center"><img src="http://content8.clipmarks.com/blog_cache/en.wikipedia.org/img/730BF2B2-5BA4-4331-9835-7BD1E84ADAB8" alt=" \Pr(n) = \int_{N=n}^{N=\infty} \Pr(n\mid N) \Pr(N) \,dN = \int_{n}^{\infty} \frac{k}{N^{(\alpha+1)}} \,dN = \frac{k}{{\alpha}n^{\alpha}}" /></div></blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Doomsday_argument&oldid=304054109"><DD>The expectation of <VAR>N</VAR> is <IMG src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/math/d/0/5/d054bff222dbd0fb6860e8501cfb4be9.png" alt=" E(N) = \int_{0}^{1} {n \over f} \, df = n \ln (1) - n \ln (0) = + \infty ." class="tex" /></DD></blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Doomsday_argument&oldid=304054109"><div align="center"><img src="http://content9.clipmarks.com/blog_cache/en.wikipedia.org/img/C1D03C93-895C-4F30-8B4B-0E5418CCBB04" alt=" P(H_{TS}|D_pX)/P(H_{TL}|D_pX) = [P(H_{FS}|X)/P(H_{FL}|X)] \cdot [P(D_p|H_{TS}X)/P(D_p|H_{TL}X)] " /></div></blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Doomsday_argument&oldid=304054109"><I>The End of the World: The Science and Ethics of Human Extinction</I></blockquote></div><div style="margin: 0px 6px 6px 4px;"><table style="font-size: 11px;border-spacing: 0px;padding: 0px;" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tr><td style="background:transparent;border-width:0px;padding:0px;">&nbsp;</td><td align="right" style="background:transparent;border-width:0px;padding:0px;width:107px" width="107"><a href="http://clipmarks.com/share/5FE429A3-7BEE-4459-967C-4071B4F1DBE2/blog/" title="blog or email this clip"><img src="http://content6.clipmarks.com/images/c2b-foot.png" border="0" alt="blog it" width="107" height="17" style="border-width:0px;padding:0px;margin:0px;" /></a></td></tr></table></div></div>

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