William M. Briggs

Muggings, Nuclear Devices, Probability & Decision

Somehow I ended up on the curious site LessWrong.com, directed by somebody with the nickname Yud (from Eliezer Yudkowsky). Odd isn't in it. Investigating it led me to Reddit and…

Culture

Eastern Michigan To Install Zampolit In Every Classroom To Maintain Ideological Purity

Maintaining ideological purity requires constant vigilance. The Commissars in the old Union of Soviet Socialist Republics knew this well. This is why they assigned zampolit, or political officers, to serve…

Statistics

Don’t Use Statistical Models (When You Don’t Have To. Which Is Nearly Always)

Today, a convincing argument proving the current practice of probability and statistics is mostly wrong, or wrong-headed. The picture above does---and does not---show herbicide use in several countries by year…

Culture Statistics

Science Asks: Why Are Angry Atheists Annoying?

What's more annoying than an atheist who harangues passersby about "rationality"? Easy answer: a scientist who announces a discovery about human behavior that was known by everybody since Adam. Our…

Philosophy SAMT

Summary Against Modern Thought: More On The Possible Intellect

See the first post in this series for an explanation and guide of our tour of Summa Contra Gentiles. All posts are under the category SAMT. Previous post. We're still…

Philosophy

Vatican Analyzes The Difference Between Humans And Robots

Soon a robot will ask you if you want fries with that. Computer screens already do, in some locales. How does that make you feel? Hungry? That could be taken…

Statistics

Scientific People Understand Reality Less, New Research Didn’t Study

Headline: Religious people understand the world less, study suggests, which derives from the peer-reviewed paper "Does Poor Understanding of Physical World Predict Religious and Paranormal Beliefs?" in Applied Cognitive Psychology…

Culture

Seventy-Five Years After Pearl Harbor

Holy moly. Shinzo Abe is going to visit Pearl Harbor "on Dec. 26-27 to pray for the dead". Who saw that coming? According to the linked report: "We must never…

Rudolph Harrier on Class 62: Die P-value, Die! Die! Die!August 23, 2025
P-values enable a lot of shenanigans, and they are dangerous because most of their "honest" users trust them too much…
John Pate on Class 62: Die P-value, Die! Die! Die!August 22, 2025
...and another thing: in Fisher's works first understanding the distribution of what you're measuring in population you are sampling from…
JH on Class 62: Die P-value, Die! Die! Die!August 22, 2025
Since your definition of p-values is not entirely correct, FYI - understanding p-values and different meanings of p-value
John Pate on Class 62: Die P-value, Die! Die! Die!August 22, 2025
To be fair to R.A. Fisher he warned people were over-enthusiastic about applying the tools he provided. He wasn't as…
McChuck on Class 62: Die P-value, Die! Die! Die!August 21, 2025
"Faster, pussycat! Kill! Kill!" You can't repeat the mantra enough.

William M. Briggs

Class 62: Die P-value, Die! Die! Die!

Research: Solar Activity Causes High Blood Pressure

The Key Role Of Probability & Chance In Science

On The Cult Of The Victim & Why We Must Reject It

Class 61: Does This Guy Have ESP? II

Funding Increases To Foster Even More Cheating In Science

Compulsory Moral Bioenhancement Should Be Covert Says Academic Who Says Ticks Should Be Genetically Modified To Stop You Eating Meat

Lying Increases Trust In Science, Says Academic

Class 60: Does This Guy Have ESP? 1

Lady Pilots Better Than Men, Says The Science

Academics Say It’s Morally Obligatory To Bioengineer Ticks To Stop You Eating Meat

New Definition Of Death To Increase Organ Harvest Bounty

Class 59: The Hardest Hypothesis In The World

The If I Were God Fallacy & Evolution

Universities Need To Be Made To Lose Prestige

Only Credentialed Artists Can Appreciate This

Does Watching TV Cause Autism?

Peer-Reviewed Research: Men Find Looking At Nearly Naked Women Distracting

A Week’s Vacation

Class 58: Hypothesis Testing Is All Wrong

Vegetarians Crave Power And Success More Than Meat Eaters Do, Study Finds