Quote:
Originally Posted by ptgatsby
Statistics > theory, I'm afraid. I'm not terribly concerned with being PC and I'm a data whore, so I tend to say exactly what it is that has been found. Ss, no matter how you want to measure IQ, has to deviate entirely from academics and related concepts in order to show their value
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I too appreciate statististics more in some problem domain where statistics have been compiled.
I've noticed that some people have strange view on data and conclusions. If you deduce something in front of their face, they think that "you just made it all up", which makes is as worthless a piece of info that anything can be.
Walk around the corner and do your deducing there, print it on a paper and put a fancy name on it, a title and an official stamp, and hallelujah, there's their fact. To me it's like magical thinking, "no independent thinking was used in making up this fact, it all came from somewhere else". It's like the kid who was being asked if he drank cow milk. He replied, "no I don't", I only drink milk from the shop".
This is so obvious it's funny. It's exactly like they say about eating meat, "wanting to eat an hamburger doesn't mean that you want to meet the cow". The "facts" like figures, data, statistics, are made by people, who sometimes arrive at the conclusions by being inspired by desire to show something. When something new is found, it has to be invented by a person at some point. It can then be said that the person just "thought it up him/herself." What a disappointment that you can't always say that A got the facts from B, B got them from C, and perpetually so to the eternity (or some person lived in the year 1700, which makes their thoughts magical).
This desire to lose track on information origin's also seems like the infinite turtle thing, too.. that the earth is being supported by a turtle, that stands on the back of another turtle, who stands on the back of another turtle, ad infinitum..
I've repeated myself a lot, but my point really being that what is some people's publicly accessible knowledge and facts, in actuality, has probably origins in some original, (somewhat) independent thinking, the kind of thinking that fact-lovers hate. A Statistical institution (worked in one for 5 years) for example may have good work ethic, experienced mathematicians, statisticians and archivers who maintain standards on what definitions are used etc. and some person has been bureaucratically assigned to the job of realeasing what become official statistics. Some persons are overseen that they use the correct methods and follow the established procedures in making the data, some are less so, when they become more trusted upon. Some work is done by starting with a compilation of statistics from existing sources and by saying that it was well compiled, and giving the unfinished work to the next person who performs the next phase in the work. At some point the unfinished work becomes unfinished and it is released as official information. It has then went thru a lot of phases which have been overseen and quality controlled, but there remains many qualities in the finished product that reflect the creator's individual decisions, whatever those might be. It's not a flaw or anything wrong, it's just not completely impersonal.
I'm sorry that I wrote so long. I would just wish to completely stop the magical thinking that facts and data are something that can somehow be done without the human factor. Our national statistical institution is one of the most trusted public institutions in our country, and it makes an impression of a faceless institution. They rely on the image to create public trust. The trust is well-earned and the statistics, research results and the articles are created according to good standards, but it's humans in the end who make it. No matter how much safe-guarding there can be on any published information, the human factor can never be taken away. Not if the papers would go through a thousand committees before being published. Not that the human factor should be taken away.
Omg I've written an essay. I just think that this is a really important issue to accept. So the bottom line:
all our facts have been essentially "made up", either by you or someone before you.
Let the refusal step in. No! Nooo!! NOOOOOO!! Not my precious facts!!! AAAARRGHHHHH!!!!!!
