Ronan Conroy wrote:
> So here's a challenge: I will send the results of a negative trial to
> anyone who believes that they can make the trial positive by torturing
> them. And if they can, I will concede that Paul's comment is more than a
> widespread bias based on a deep rooted fear of mathematics instilled by
> generations of incompetent primary school teachers.
I too believe that the quote is overstated. If every percentile of the
data in Group A is smaller than the corresponding percentile in Group B,
then no amount of data torturing will show that A is better than B
(assuming that larger is better). So rather than saying "confess to
anything", the quote I use is:
If you torture your data long enough, it will confess to something.
--
Steve Simon, Standard Disclaimer
Sign up for The Monthly Mean at www.pmean.com/news
|