3 ms·

Why not billions? If you’re going to lie with statistics, might as well lie big.

• Clubber 2y ago
  "If we include people in their 20's, teen deaths skyrocket!"
• FrustratedMonky 2y ago
  You sound like someone that says Chernobyl only killed a few people, the few workers at the site. And ignore the thousands that died later of radiation poisoning, cancer that occurred years later. People argue about the Chernobyl statistics also, but ask yourself who/why people want to spread uncertainty. To make the risk appear smaller.
  • skeeter2020 2y ago
    that's not what these researchers are saying, and the warped coverage is making worse. If you where a worker at Chernobyl uneffected by the accident, but lost your job, and then couldn't afford dental care, and your child got an abscessed tooth that went septic and they died, this methodology would count it as an "infant mortality caused by nuclear accidents". Their (several levels of) indirect grouping to make an impactful headline is what I object to; which is too bad because the real story here is the more subtle but important and very real uneven and long-term impact of huricanes is under measured.
  • ein0p 2y ago
    This would be like saying that millions died a few months before they normally would 30-40 years later because they had higher levels of stress due to the accident. The statistical (let alone causal!) connection in such things is so tenuous, it’s utterly meaningless. Control groups or randomized testing is impossible even in principle. Meanwhile, we can’t even reliably determine if eating eggs increases cholesterol.
    • FrustratedMonky 2y ago
      "saying that millions died a few months before they normally would 30-40 years later because they had higher levels of stress due to the accident." Isn't this exactly the type of reasoning they are using? You seem to be using this as an example to refute the study, when that is exactly the point. I just think the whole "statistics is magic so we should not trust any science and go back to living in trees" trope is getting a bit tired. It is 21st century, because people have learned their statistics from the internet doesn't mean studies are invalid. The whole point is that there are methods to determine if something is " utterly meaningless" beyond a knee jerk reaction.
      • hackeraccount 2y ago
        As long as you can accept that kind of statistical argument for things that you did not agree with a priori.
        • FrustratedMonky 2y ago
          Well. They didn't consult with me on this study to see if I agreed a priori. But I am able to understand what they are attempting to quantify. I'm just not in the camp of something being difficult means it is garbage. It isn't that hard to conceptualize: -> traumatic event happens, -> there are follow on ramifications, -> some of them shorten life spans. -> And a shortened life span means death. As others in the thread said. Maybe something like " Quality-adjust life years (QALYs)" would have been more generalizable metric.
          • hackeraccount 2y ago
            I understand the logic it just seems like using that chain of consequences seems to produce weird results i.e. Item A kills 1% of the population a year, item B kill 1% a year, Item C kills 1% a year but somehow only 1% of the population dies every year. Though QALYs may get at that.
            • 2y ago