3 ms·
Yes I think Gelman is doing great work, as is e.g. McElreath [1]. The problem that I care about is not whether frequentist statistics can be taught and used we
by uniqueuid 4y ago
Yes I think Gelman is doing great work, as is e.g. McElreath [1].
The problem that I care about is not whether frequentist statistics can be taught and used well. They can, and I try in my teaching to do so.
The problem is that empirically, frequentist statistics is a fig leaf for a ton of extremely problematic work. And pushing bayesian thinking is currently our best chance to fix this, because it's easier to do a shift in the mental framework than to fix the perception of an existing framework.
[1] https://xcelab.net/rm/statistical-rethinking/ https://xcelab.net/rm/statistical-rethinking/
- civilized 4y agoI agree that more Bayesian thinking is needed. But I suspect that pushing the technicalities of Bayesian analysis (MCMC etc) would perversely lead to even more cargo-culting, as people would struggle with the technicalities and look desperately for quick fixes. Bayesian methodology benefits from having relatively much more statistically sophisticated practitioners, which leads to an optimism bias when we imagine how it would scale up.
- uniqueuid 4y agoPerhaps you don't see it this way, but I take our eventual convergence as a sign that we don't actually disagree. It's rather that the problem we're starting from is different. Thanks for taking your time for this debate!
- civilized 4y agoLikewise! This is a tricky problem and requires a lot of patient thought.