4 ms·

I think you deeply misunderstand the statistical nature of a world record. there is a piece out there somewhere about zelezney's record being a more significant

I think you deeply misunderstand the statistical nature of a world record. there is a piece out there somewhere about zelezney's record being a more significant outlier than Bolt's. But to be clear, you're insinuating that Jan was a cheat? I had training sessions with the former AR holder and numerous conversations with a former WR holder and threw at a high level. I'm quite familiar with the sport and I'm truly curious as to whether you're making this claim about JZ and if you could name 10 throwers without Googling it.

lelanthran 5y ago
> I'm quite familiar with the sport and I'm truly curious as to whether you're making this claim about JZ and if you could name 10 throwers without Googling it. What does his claim[1] have to do with knowing who the throwers are? FWIW, I think that, if you look at a sport and find that the performance of athletes in that sport decreased significantly after the introduction of more comprehensive drug testing, then it is not unreasonable to assume the higher performance was due to drug-related enhancements. [1] He's just making a point about the statistics. We don't need to know the name of the data points.
- pedrosorio 5y ago
  "FWIW, I think that, if you look at a sport and find that the performance of athletes in that sport decreased significantly after the introduction of more comprehensive drug testing" The issue is the premise is incorrect. 11 of the top 20 throws ever happened since 2015: https://www.worldathletics.org/records/all-time-toplists/throws/javelin-throw/outdoor/men/senior?regionType=world&page=1&bestResultsOnly=false&firstDay=1899-12-31&lastDay=2021-08-08 https://www.worldathletics.org/records/all-time-toplists/thr...
- getlawgdon 5y ago
  I think you should spend some time plotting throws of the last 20 years using performances from top athletes the worldathletics website. You'll discover that you are mistaken. This suggestion is related to to for why the claim matters, which is familiarity with the sport (as represented by the ability to name its participants). As a longtime participant in track and field, athlete, coach, and fan, I have invariably found that people reduce perceived phenomena to doping usually have no idea what's actually going on in the sport and aren't involved in it in any substantive way. So, "show your familiarity" is a jabby heuristic to prove the point.
  - lelanthran 5y ago
    > You'll discover that you are mistaken. Mistaken about what? That the assumption of doping is not unreasonable? After all, I didn't say the assumption of drug-use was likely correct, I said that the assumption itself is not unreasonable. > So, "show your familiarity" is a jabby heuristic to prove the point. Being involved in the subjects (say, by following their career?) is evidence of bias when drawing conclusions from data points. In other words, the heuristic is actually the other way around - if you're "familiar" with the subjects you're the wrong person to be drawing conclusions from the statistics. It's why we insist on double-blind trials for some things - the researcher has to be ignorant of the subjects involved. Being familiar with them means the conclusions are invalid.
sschueller 5y ago
It is quite possible that compounds that were legal back then are no longer legal. So someone could have legally used them and therefore would not be considered a "cheat".

lelanthran 5y ago

> I'm quite familiar with the sport and I'm truly curious as to whether you're making this claim about JZ and if you could name 10 throwers without Googling it. What does his claim[1] have to do with knowing who the throwers are? FWIW, I think that, if you look at a sport and find that the performance of athletes in that sport decreased significantly after the introduction of more comprehensive drug testing, then it is not unreasonable to assume the higher performance was due to drug-related enhancements. [1] He's just making a point about the statistics. We don't need to know the name of the data points.

pedrosorio 5y ago
"FWIW, I think that, if you look at a sport and find that the performance of athletes in that sport decreased significantly after the introduction of more comprehensive drug testing" The issue is the premise is incorrect. 11 of the top 20 throws ever happened since 2015: https://www.worldathletics.org/records/all-time-toplists/throws/javelin-throw/outdoor/men/senior?regionType=world&page=1&bestResultsOnly=false&firstDay=1899-12-31&lastDay=2021-08-08 https://www.worldathletics.org/records/all-time-toplists/thr...
getlawgdon 5y ago
I think you should spend some time plotting throws of the last 20 years using performances from top athletes the worldathletics website. You'll discover that you are mistaken. This suggestion is related to to for why the claim matters, which is familiarity with the sport (as represented by the ability to name its participants). As a longtime participant in track and field, athlete, coach, and fan, I have invariably found that people reduce perceived phenomena to doping usually have no idea what's actually going on in the sport and aren't involved in it in any substantive way. So, "show your familiarity" is a jabby heuristic to prove the point.
- lelanthran 5y ago
  > You'll discover that you are mistaken. Mistaken about what? That the assumption of doping is not unreasonable? After all, I didn't say the assumption of drug-use was likely correct, I said that the assumption itself is not unreasonable. > So, "show your familiarity" is a jabby heuristic to prove the point. Being involved in the subjects (say, by following their career?) is evidence of bias when drawing conclusions from data points. In other words, the heuristic is actually the other way around - if you're "familiar" with the subjects you're the wrong person to be drawing conclusions from the statistics. It's why we insist on double-blind trials for some things - the researcher has to be ignorant of the subjects involved. Being familiar with them means the conclusions are invalid.

sschueller 5y ago

It is quite possible that compounds that were legal back then are no longer legal. So someone could have legally used them and therefore would not be considered a "cheat".