One characteristic of LaRouche followers -- if you don't like the word "supporters" -- is that they hide behind convoluted rhetoric without ever quite getting to the point they're ostensibly making. You have the patter down well, and if you aren't in fact one of his followers, you could pass for one easily.
Actually I made the point quite clear. 0 or 1. Probability, confidence intervals, correlation, never actually hit 1, and no matter how high they go up it's still a .00000000001 or a .999999999 or somewhere in between or even further out in the fractions of a number. They never actually hit 0 or 1. This is reality. Which means in reality, it never hits anything. This is quite simple and easy. They never tell you 0 or 1. Thus they never tell you anything real. If they could tell you 0 or 1, and are as constant and reliable as decaying nuclei, I'd say, hey statistics tell you something. But they don't.
Statistics, are man made, and they are guesses, nothing more. Guesses can be right, but the process of guessing isn't science, even if it sometimes it first involves a guess from an observation. The science isn't the guess. It's the result of whether the process observation cannot be disproved. Don't work it backwards. Science isn't guessing. Science is the end result process irrespective of whatever guesses came before it. Think of it this way. Whatever is .97999 can have it's model altered to be .98999 or then again to .99999. It's just manipulation of numbers, variables, adding or subtracting one. Trying to justify it.
I said I agree with ideas, which means I don't follow people or support people per se. I agree with certain ideas that can be attributed to various people. But belief in PEOPLE instead of IDEAS, is a derivative that can and usually does lead to a disassociation from facts.
Which means people don't need to understand or even think about the idea or find out what is right or wrong, valid or invalid, they'll just believe the person to have figured it out. Then even more disassociation from the idea singularly, is a group of people that might give each other a name. Then they'll believe because the group says so. The best way is to understand the idea. The merits of an idea is what you throw your support behind, if it factual, based on actual science, and overall is real. So if I 'support' this group or that group, would actually be incorrect. I support specific ideas that happen to be fostered by various groups.
Thus I was just being honest that I don't 'support' a person. It's quite clear the rationale behind it. The people you describe to have a problem with, actually have ideas that are real. Maybe some of them don't understand. Any group has people that follow people or groups instead of ideas. Maybe you talk to them. I don't know.
I'm not using any tactic. No one has ever taught me any tactic. I never went to some spin school or something lol. I just try to explain something because I feel someone isn't seeing something, and thus multiple directions tends to isolate an idea. Metaphorically boxes it in. Draws a frame. Something. So if I come at a problem multiple directions it is just to put a better picture in the reader's head and/or give another singular one they can grasp onto.
Like....When you buy a hamburger are you supporting McDonalds, or are you eating because you are hungry. You are eating because you are hungry, it just so happens that at that meal, you are 'supporting' McDonalds.
Of course you are 'supporting' McDonalds with your money. But that wasn't why you bought McDonalds. You were hungry, and various factors, maybe distance, maybe taste, in this case random fast food purchase as an example of a routine process was why I used it metaphorically.
So change the metaphor from eating and McDonalds to an idea that a person/group fosters, and hopefully you can understand what I mean.
But with the above, you actually went out on a limb and made a real claim: That statistics aren't science. And on that point, you are unfortunately unequivocally wrong.
I will offer a simple example, which is that of radioactive decay. A radioactive sample contains a large number of nuclei, each of which will eventually decay, splitting into two or more smaller parts and releasing energy in the process. (Hopefully we can at least agree on this.)
It is well known, confirmed thousands of times over, that you can characterize the time scale of this process using something called a "half-life." The half-life is the amount of time that will elapse before approximately half of the atoms in the sample decay. One must say "approximately," but because the number of atoms is so large, in fact the variance on a percentage basis is small.
It is impossible to predict when a given nucleus will decay. Nor is it possible to predict which half of them will decay within the half-life. And yet you can predict with confidence that, sure enough, roughly half of the atoms will have indeed decayed during that interval.
That is pure statistics, and it is also science. And it is fact. It would be easy to come up with lots of other examples, of course, but this one is vivid and clear.
Let's see, actually the description of the rate of nuclei isn't statistics. You can describe it as a process that can be described numerically. You are confusing the two. It isn't however a statistical model. You see man made number manipulation of any sort, isn't a natural process of science. Both can attempt to describe something numerically. Only one is actually real.
It isn't a natural pattern governed by the laws of the universe. You can attempt to recreate something by number manipulation in a similar pattern, or develop a brand new one, but it doesn't make it science. That is the pattern of decaying nuclei. It isn't if Steve Nash is better than Joe Johnson, or something in value will go up or down, or whether it will rain tomorrow based on x, y, and z.
You're confusing natural patterns with man made ones, and equating the two as equal. They are assuredly not. That is the main point. Joe Shmoe at Harvard manipulating numbers whether it be for whatever profession, or in this case for fun to see what player is better or poster or whatever, is not the same as decaying nuclei. This is crystal clear. Science isn't man made. Man can only discover science. It cannot create it. Only learn ways to access it and benefit from that. But the underlying Science has always been there waiting to be accessed.
I just don't see how it's not obvious. Decaying nuclei is not Joe Shmoe's guesses, even if both can be described numerically.
Now, from your signature file, I surmise that what really frightens you about statistics is the extent to which some economists seem to rely on them in order to advocate for certain economic policies. And I agree that that is a questionable enterprise. But that is not the fault of the statistics; but instead of their misuse.
This is a classic LaRouchean tactic -- appealing to a rhetorical truism as though it is somehow germane to the discussion. But we aren't arguing about whether a dead man is dead.
You're so close on this note. The practice of utilizing statistics for any reason is as valid as any economist. The uses don't matter. You can get advocates for it for various economic schools of thought, or for when it rains, there are so many aspects it goes into. They are all guesses just the same, and none of them are like the decaying nuclei.
It's just the real world disasters that arise from it are more widely felt since it happens in integral processes to humanity. The point is, whenever it is used (man made), is as valid as any other man made use. They are pure guesses, that aren't science. Just certain places we feel the impact more than others. Some could be more often right than others, but they are still all guesses prone to major, and sometimes catastrophic errors.
Thus my point was with the analogy of dead people was simple, I was attempting to show you that Joe Shmoe isn't decaying Nuclei, no matter how much we argue it won't change that a man made model isn't a scientific process of decaying nuclei. There is a huge difference between the two. One is correct. One isn't. By it's nature man made models and probabilities will never give you a one.
Yes, it is an easy concept, and it reveals how little you understand about statistics. Statistics do not predict certainties, but instead probabilities. If such-and-such a weather pattern has produced rain in 800 out of the last 1000 times that it has been present, then one may predict with reasonable confidence that the probability of rain is 80%. But that is not a certainty.
You see rain 800 out of 1000 times doesn't mean anything on whether it actually is going to rain or not at any time in the future. I understand it quite well. The process will either initiate or not, irrespective of whatever the numbers state, based on the actual factors present in the process at hand, that a model is not derived of. You keep saying I don't understand it. I'm describing the limitations of the entire field. It's 0 or 1. 800 out of 1000 isn't either and never will be. Thus you cannot ever actually use the knowledge.
Thus any probability is inherently meaningless, even if it hints at something. Obviously the indicators show that something that causes rain is present and that it might occur, but the models guess is as good as anyone's as it doesn't accurately describe the process. Using this as a foundation for something is what it is always used for, otherwise it's just academic nothings. If we're talking in a classroom for just crap and giggles is one thing. But to ever apply it, is asinine.
An additional fact is that they rarely state that it is a guess. Most people don't describe it as a guess that might either happen or not. They say 800 out of 1000 means something highly likely. Just like .999 that something isn't going to happen means it will almost never be likely to happen. But those numbers are always wrong. Because future isn't the past. We're talking about separate events, and statistics pretends they are linked. They try to teach you six sigma, and try to tell you to prepare for that level, which is really just an out. The fact remains that six sigma events are breached with regularity that makes the whole idea of six sigma moot. It happens WAY more often.
Either way, when you substitute an actual scientific process, with a man-made guess you've only introduced error, not eliminated it. Put it in a course, and it supposedly is an legitimate out for failure. Well it met Six sigma standards. This is what we base our world off of, is crap like this. It's failure built in at every level.
I'm not defending any such thing, and putting words in the other party's mouth is another LaRouche tactic that I can't stand.
Look, I've tried to have discussions with your kind before. The discussions always fail because I can't keep the other person on a single point of contention long enough to refute it. LaRouchies bob and weave, throw out bizarre distractors ("A dead man is dead"), appeal to grand irrefutable statements ("You can't tell me how many total variables there are in the universe"), and yet somehow never reveal exactly what it is that they're trying to convince you of. It is, I admit, an intriguing phenomenon, and a "debate" style that is a skill in its own right, if ultimately fruitless.
I wasn't trying to put words in your mouth, so if I did, I apologize.
Actually most people use analogies. The fact remains that no man-made model will never contain in it, every possible variable, in proper 'weighting' that can describe a process exactly in a way that gives the future. The human mind has not deciphered basketball, and physics, and the universe it resides in enough to describe, especially backwards by guessing, a model that numerically describes the process of figuring out better players or posters, or whatever.
We've hitched our wagon to guesses based on number manipulation and introduced error based on mathematics as a rule, not an exception. Using models to find the probability of rain is inferior to actually scientifically determining the processes of rain and everything connected to it.
I haven't bobbed and weaved anywhere. I've stated clearly the fallacies of statistics. Because there is the angle within the sphere of it's use of 'it's only probabilities' as if probabilities are in any way valid. They are nothing more than guesses. But these guesses are used everywhere in real situations where facts are needed. Thus their inclusion at any time, is asinine. We've guaranteed failure above and beyond what might otherwise occur. We may say 'they are just probabilities', but by any way we use them, that disclaimer is thrown right out the window.
Yes, it should be obvious that this isn't personal. I'm just trying to get a clearer handle on why your thinking is so muddled. When did they get to you?
My thinking isn't muddled. I don't lump together man made models with scientific processes that can be described with numbers. I'm also not the person that implements it in everything (obviously not saying you), and considers it a good idea to create them for every situation rather than finding an actual scientific way to describe something, if even ever possible. I see it as a futile exercise, because it will never be true, and one will never really know how untrue it is, just that it will never BE true. Thus the entire point to attribute something so complex based on a model is one that is folly. Why even engage in it? Besides maybe fun. But that wasn't the goal. It was to determine something. You can't determine anything based on a model. Finding conclusion on a bedrock of guesses just doesn't make sense.
Again, I believe in factual ideas. Not a particular person. You could say I subscribe to ideas that are subscribed by many people and groups, even if on the surface they are very different. That's why I can visit some sites that one might see as anti the group you mention, yet in reality have certain commonalities with specific ideas. Ideas aren't always fostered by one group. You can find many of the same ideas fostered by many different groups. It isn't like the group you mention has created many of these ideas. Most of what they and others support, originally come from a different wellspring. But I also tend to gravitate around certain groups which have a boatload of ideas and/or valid pertinent questions.
I tended to think you weren't really getting personal, it's just when people get the impression the 'you people' type expression is being thrown at them, one does start to question it. But it happens, so you know whatever. It's all good. I guess you have to be on the receiving end, you were instead on the writing end. No problemo.
Just take one thing. Scientific processes described numerically or as a numeric process are not the same as a man made one. One is real. The other cannot be. Because if man discovers a pattern that is scientific, it is real process that has always been there....a person creating a model, or gauging probability, is just guessing. The two are not the same. Model makers never guess right. They never will.
I hope you see what I at least see as an easy distinction between the two. Not inferring anything if not, just to me, it's plain as day what I'm trying to describe. Because the profession is not being used to discover decaying nuclei type processes, it's being used to guess. (obviously not absolute, but I consider the two separate)
Worse still, is just about everyone takes it as fact. The proprietors of the guesswork, aren't doing their job at explaining the disclaimer....and to bring it back why I started this whole thing is that whenever someone tries to create some validity from numbers like this out of thin air, it's going to be wrong, and can be another instance of fooling people into forgetting the disclaimer. Even the author. If we all go around practicing it regarding everything, what good is the disclaimer, since it's tenants are being disregarded.
