"If frequentism is thus on a quest for experimental objectivity, Bayesianism might be called “subjective.” This isn’t to say it’s arbitrary or sloppy. It simply has a different notion of what probability ultimately means. Bayesians interpret probability as a quantitative personal assessment of the likelihood of something happening. They point out that for many (most) events of interest, trials are neither possible nor sensible. Suppose I’m considering asking a girl out to the prom, and I’m trying to estimate how likely it is she’ll go with me. It’s not like I’m going to ask her a hundred times and count how many times she says yes, then divide by 100 to get a probability. There is in fact no way to perform a trial or use past data to guide me, and at any rate she’s only going to say yes or no once. So based on my background knowledge and my assumptions about her, myself, and the world, I form an opinion which could be quantified as a “percent chance.” Once I’ve formed this opinion (which of course involves guesswork and subjectivity) I can then reason about it mathematically, using all the tools we’ve been developing. Of special interest to Bayesians is the notion of updating probabilities when new information comes to light, a topic we’ll return to in a moment. For the Bayesian, the probability of some hypothesis being true is between 0 and 1, and when an agent (a human, or a bot) makes decisions, he/she/it does so on the most up-to-date information he/she/it has, always revising beliefs in various hypotheses when confirming or refuting evidence is encountered. Famous Bayesians include Pierre-Simon Laplace, sometimes called “the French Isaac Newton” for his scientific brilliance, and 18th century theologian Thomas Bayes, for whom the theory is named. I won’t try to conceal that my own thinking on this topic is pretty Bayesian. But I find this whole topic fascinating because it shows how brilliant people, who unanimously agree on the rules and equations, can have such radically different interpretations of what it all means."