The Gauss' Bayes Factor

Abstract

In 'Theoria motus corporum coelestium in sectionibus conicis solem ambientum' Gauss presents, as a theorem and with emphasis, the rule to update the ratio of probabilities of complementary hypotheses, in the light of an observed event which could be due to either of them. Although he focused on a priori equally probable hypotheses, in order to solve the problem on which he was interested in, the theorem can be easily extended to the general case. But, curiously, I have not been able to find references to his result in the literature.