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What's the point of fitting arbitrary functions to noise? Because that's what high p-values would lead to. Undue emphasis on p-values is bad, but what you're s
by tpeo 9y ago
What's the point of fitting arbitrary functions to noise? Because that's what high p-values would lead to.
Undue emphasis on p-values is bad, but what you're suggesting is bonkers.
- nonbel 9y agoStop funding people to fit arbitrary functions to noise?
- tpeo 9y agoDon't be disingenuous. That would require someone to actually read their papers, which would already be a net loss and a massive waste of time for everyone involved. Not to mention the amount of department politics which could be involved in this issue. Look, not every paper is worth publishing. There are many ways to write noise that can pass for signal given the reader's level of understanding (e.g. crack pottery and "fashionable nonsense"). The usage of p-values implements self-filtering to some degree, and makes everyone better off by increasing the likelihood that at least some papers aren't complete nonsense. And that's good. The only issue is that it is a much weaker constraint on publishing than it was previously thought.
- JoshTriplett 9y ago> Look, not every paper is worth publishing. Many more results should be documented than currently are, though, including negative results. But I agree that changing p-value thresholds is unrelated to that.
- tpeo 9y agoI agree, publication bias is a thing. There's no questioning that.
- Houshalter 9y agoAnd not publishing wastes everyone's time. When researches perform the same experiment again and again until someone gets a significant result to publish. There are entire fields of research supported by nothing but publication bias (e.g. Parapsychology and possibly most soft sciences.)