Statistics – Page 123 – William M. Briggs

The Epidemiologist Fallacy Strikes Again — Pesticides & Autism

Long-time readers will recall the epidemiologist fallacy is a shotgun marriage of the ecological fallacy and wee p-values. Make that and/or confidence intervals. For confidence intervals are equivalent to p-values…

Class Statistics

So-Called Random Numbers And Encryption: Update With Real-World Example

Psst. Hey, buddy. Word to the wise: "GQNZWZURUDPBFWDMEGBYIXGBGZRSVNHWOIQPPSH GXUVMZ". Keep it secret. That odd string of letters and spaces (well, once space) contains an encrypted message. In order to read…

Statistics

Case Study Of How Easy It Is To Go Wrong

We used to talk a lot about the amygdala here: Yet Another Study "Proves" Liberal, Conservative Brain Differences (wee ps, amygdalas), Scientists Suddenly Discover Men Don't Understand Women (wee ps,…

Class Statistics

When Testing Parameters Might Make Sense

This example is derived from ongoing conversations with a colleague, and portions of this post (mathematified) might show up in a paper. The genesis of this example is from Ron…

Statistics

SAT’s Adversity Score New Way To Enforce Racial Quotas

The College Board will soon attach Pity Points to SAT scores. The Pity Points will be used to suggest that those who scored poorly did not in fact score poorly…

Statistics

An Infinity of Null Hypotheses — Another Anti-P-Value Argument

This is extracted from this set of papers, which should be read in full. An ordinary regression model is written mu = beta_0x_1 + ... + beta_0x_p, where mu…

Statistics

Many Atheists Still Believe In Higher Powers—Whatever Those Are

A new report on atheists is of interest. It's "Understanding Unbelief: Atheists and agnostics around the world: Interim findings from 2019 research in Brazil, China, Denmark, Japan, the United Kingdom,…

Statistics

Post-Approval Drug Failures: More Reasons To Eliminate P-values & Parameter-Centric Methods

Some comments on the JAMA: Internal Medicine article "An International Perspective on Drugs for Cancer: The Best of Times, the Worst of Times" by Richard Lehman. Drugs increase fast, and…

Brian (bulaoren) on All Models Only Say What They Are Told To Say, And AI Is A ModelMarch 27, 2026
Logic, empiricism, wisdom... These solvents are without impact for people who have, so often, survived them. I believe this is…
spetzer86 on All Models Only Say What They Are Told To Say, And AI Is A ModelMarch 27, 2026
It's interesting that the commenters using AI prove the point that the use of a model yielding apparently random results…
JH on All Models Only Say What They Are Told To Say, And AI Is A ModelMarch 27, 2026
When brilliant minds join forces with advanced computers that execute tasks with precision and speed by following instructions, they achieve…
fergus on All Models Only Say What They Are Told To Say, And AI Is A ModelMarch 27, 2026
Post script. Looks like you are hiding well, for now, from the AI in the sky. I asked it if…
fergus on All Models Only Say What They Are Told To Say, And AI Is A ModelMarch 27, 2026
Did not read the article, just copy/pasted the number list to ChatGPT and it got right back with: Yes —…