Posted inPhilosophy Statistics
The I-Have-Big-Muscles Fallacy
Harvard graduate walks down the street where a 50-lb sack of cement blocks his way. He reaches down to shift it but discovers that despite all his might the bulk…
Posted inStatistics
Fermi’s Paradox & Gaian Bottlenecks
Democracy (the system) is enough to account for the seeming alien life-form which is Hillary and for whatever that thing is on Trump's head. But as queer as Democracy is…
Posted inPhilosophy Statistics
A Brief Explanation Of Occam’s Razor
We're interested in whether some proposition Y is true. One explanation, perhaps causal or deterministic, or even only probabilistic, is X. Thus, Pr(Y | X) is high or equals 1.…
Posted inPhilosophy Statistics
The Bayesian Metaphor Can Do More Harm Than Good: Update
Quoting from a post on vampires, "In Bayesian inference, you start with some initial beliefs (called 'Bayesian priors' or just 'priors'), and then you 'update' them as you receive new…
Posted inCulture Philosophy Statistics
Why Is Economics Plagued By Math?
The answer is easy: because math is numbers and numbers are measurement and measurements are necessary to make a subject "scientific" in the modern sense of that word. Why should…
Posted inBook review Statistics
Book Update — Uncertainty & Breaking The Law Of Averages
I'll have the page proofs for Uncertainty mid week and I've until 10 June to turn them back in. (I begin teaching on the 13th.) This puts publication in early…
Posted inPhilosophy Statistics
Quantum Mechanics, Potentiality, Ontology, Epistemology, & Probability
What is and what is known about what is are two concepts which are often entangled, especially in quantum mechanics (puns intentional). This is one of the subjects which I…
Posted inStatistics
Brits Psychologists Cry “BS!” Over Research Practices. Or, Die P-Value, Die Die Die
In The British Psychological Society's official organ The Psychologist, two gents Tom Farsides and Paul Sparks, call BS on standard research practices. There is a worrying amount of outright fraud…