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It's scary how we are increasingly being judged and predicted using statistics and mathematics. It's also very sad to see it go wrong like this (whatever happen

by moe 17y ago

It's scary how we are increasingly being judged and predicted using statistics and mathematics. It's also very sad to see it go wrong like this (whatever happened to "innocent until proven guilty"?). Imho the most scary part is how accurate these calculations and predictions are on average and how on that base they have begun to invade our daily lives. A court might rule me guilty because the numbers say there's a 85% probability. A company might not employ me because the analysis of my friends-graph, school and other public history suggests a 70% probability that $other_candidate would add more value than me. Health insurance might not take me in because my genes suggest a 50% probability of an expensive disease.

jerf 17y ago
"whatever happened to 'innocent until proven guilty'?" A math problem for you: Given an innumerate judge, an innumerate prosecution, an innumerate defense, and 12 innumerate jury members, what is the probability that a fundamentally-innumerate verdict will be reached? Using statistics for decisions we don't want decided with statistics is problem, but as far as I can tell right now it is flat-out dominated by the fact nobody can use them correctly. Truthfully, having learned quite a lot of math, my feeling is that when a "normal person" starts hearing about statistics and they get the "eyes glaze over" thing going on, that's the rational answer. I wish more people understood basic physics, I wish more people understood basic finances and the principles of interest, but, honestly, when a normal person encounters a statistic they should pretty much just ignore it. The odds that a given stat either came from someone innumerate, or someone deliberately (or accidentally!) bending it to make a predetermined point (which makes the stat useless) really, truly, no sarcasm, no cynicism, are so close to 100% that simply ignoring is the best answer.

by moe 17y ago

jerf 17y ago

"whatever happened to 'innocent until proven guilty'?" A math problem for you: Given an innumerate judge, an innumerate prosecution, an innumerate defense, and 12 innumerate jury members, what is the probability that a fundamentally-innumerate verdict will be reached? Using statistics for decisions we don't want decided with statistics is problem, but as far as I can tell right now it is flat-out dominated by the fact nobody can use them correctly. Truthfully, having learned quite a lot of math, my feeling is that when a "normal person" starts hearing about statistics and they get the "eyes glaze over" thing going on, that's the rational answer. I wish more people understood basic physics, I wish more people understood basic finances and the principles of interest, but, honestly, when a normal person encounters a statistic they should pretty much just ignore it. The odds that a given stat either came from someone innumerate, or someone deliberately (or accidentally!) bending it to make a predetermined point (which makes the stat useless) really, truly, no sarcasm, no cynicism, are so close to 100% that simply ignoring is the best answer.