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There are many questions on this site about subjective probabilities, epistemic probabilities, assigning probabilities/credences to hypotheses, bayesian reasoning, etc. The following are just a few examples:

If epistemic probabilities are real, they must exist somewhere. Under physicalism, they would presumably have to correspond to physical states in the brain. Even under alternative metaphysical views, such as dualism, epistemic probabilities would still require some kind of physical counterpart—unless they are somehow stored in the "spiritual" or "immaterial mind."

Do epistemic probabilities exist?

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    I'm not really sure what answer you'd be expecting here. A physicalist would just answer "yes". While a non-physical would answer: yes, no, maybe, I don't know. With probably not much to expand on beyond that. The actual physical brain state representing probability would be way deep into neuroscience research. Although there's a side issue that one might reject the idea of epistemic probability altogether.
    – NotThatGuy
    Commented yesterday
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    @user80226 If the entirety of consciousness reduce to brain activity, and if epistemic probability is part of consciousness, then that would also reduce to brain activity. There are lots of reasons to think consciousness reduces to brain activity, and there doesn't seem to be any reason to think epistemic probability would be an exception (but again, assuming you accept epistemic probability to be a thing at all).
    – NotThatGuy
    Commented yesterday
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    You'd avoid a lot of the problems with this question by changing "brain" to "mind", to ask whether epistemic probability is a thing at all, rather than focusing on the union of physicalism and that. But answers to that probably isn't going to tell you where that exists, because the brain is far too complex to pinpoint the exact neurons corresponding to some thought (and that'll probably vary based on the thought, and vary from one person to the next). Meanwhile, non-physicalists are far, far further away from having any sort of answer about that.
    – NotThatGuy
    Commented yesterday
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    You seem still linger on the abandoned logical positivist's sense-data like theories which confuse brain activities with some actually non-existent private language's representation of some high level aboutness concepts like probabilities. Recall aboutness as mark of the mental is being of something instead of the usual being something measurable in physical observations...
    – Double Knot
    Commented yesterday
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    @user80226 I’m saying that your objection is pointless since for obvious reasons, a child can’t even make a bet, and so the concept of an epistemic probability doesn’t apply. The point is that it’s an irrelevant point
    – Syed
    Commented yesterday

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I think this question is yet another one based on different interpretations of the word "exist".

If these probabilities are ideas and interpretations, they exist in the same way, and to the same degree, that other ideas and interpretations do.

Yes, a physicalist would say that these reside in the brain, and that we are still learning where and exactly how they are stored and processed.

If you insist on putting them elsewhere, you will have to explain how they interact with the body, and why intoxication of or damage to the brain can inhibit ability to access and manipulate them. I submit that this is no easier then explaining the mind as the state of the brain, and to me it seems harder.

Note: as always, this is based on my own understanding of physicalism. I am not going to do a full literature search on the question; I simply don't feel that much need to defend it. I am merely indicating that the appearance of contradiction only exists if you start by rejecting physicalism.

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  • "If you insist on putting them elsewhere" - You can also put them nowhere (i.e., reject their existence).
    – user80226
    Commented yesterday
  • @user80226: Certainly, if that's your preferred answer. "Mu."
    – keshlam
    Commented yesterday

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