Posted inStatistics
Bad Astronomer Does Bad Statistics: That Wall Street Journal Editorial
Remember when I said how you shouldn't draw straight lines in time series and then speak of the line as if the line was the data itself? About how the…
Posted inStatistics
EPA Can Fine You As Long As It Wants—With No Review
EPA Agent Stephen Segal protects the wetlands The EPA came to Idaho and said in a booming voice Stop! to Mike and Chantell Sackett, who were building a home on…
Posted inFun
First Signs of Rampant Global Cooling Seen At Nome, Alaska?
The headline from the 12 January 2012 Nome Nugget ("Alaska's Oldest Newspaper!") strikes a chill into one's heart: Nome in long deep freeze. The Nome post of the National…
Posted inStatistics
What A Prediction Is And What It Is Not: Part IV
There is a technical distinction between a scenario and a prediction, though the line is fine and often disputable. Many scenarios are merely intolerably loose, and therefore useless, predictions. The…
Posted inPhilosophy Statistics
What A Prediction Is And What It Is Not: Part III
This inescapable fact, that the conditioning evidence is only assumed and is therefore subjectively defined, is responsible for much acrimony about accuracy. Thus the reason we attempt to eliminate wiggle…
Posted inStatistics
Statistics Compared To Ladies Of Ill Repute?
While Theoretical Statistics is (mainly) a decent albeit rather boring mathematical discipline (Probability Theory is much more exciting), so called Applied Statistics is in its big part a whore. Finding…
Posted inPhilosophy Statistics
Can fMRI Predict Who Believes In God? Part VII (Last)
Read Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V, Part VI, Part VII There are a number of serious difficulties with this study. The experimental protocol is unusual;…
Posted inCulture Fun Statistics
Predictions For 2011. How’d We do?
Last January 1st I asked for everybody to provide verifiable predictions for the year. Time for reckoning! Tomorrow I'll ask us to provide predictions for 2012, so hold off on…