4 ms·
It makes it harder (impossible even) to take precise measurements deep into the decimal places if you have massive contours in the very thing (wealth) you are t
by ta20240528 2y ago
It makes it harder (impossible even) to take precise measurements deep into the decimal places if you have massive contours in the very thing (wealth) you are trying to measure with just one scalar number.
Diversity is not meant in the modern political interpretation.
As an less triggering exercise: try record in a single number the temperature - and change - of a large geographically diverse place like Australia - which has deserts and forests and is also subject to large periodic fluctuations like el Niño/la Niña.
I submit that you would be embarrassed to say it went from 28,7°C to 29,2°C and think it meant anything.
The misuse (and misunderstanding) of significant figures (let alone averages) is rampant in the social sciences. To the disadvantage of the folk we are all trying to help.
- defrost 2y agoIf the mean rolling average of all tempreture readings across Australia moved by 0.5 across a twelve month period that would indeed be a significant change that would certainly mean something.
- spinningarrow 2y agoCan you elaborate on that? Why would it be significant and what could it mean?
- exe34 2y agoit would mean it was warmer.
- bluGill 2y agoThat is also something really hard to measure correctly. There are many sources of error that are hard to correct for.
- defrost 2y agoThe Central Limit Theorem smooths any errors. Decades of observation data make instrument errors very easy to spot. In recent decades daily MODIS (satellite) polar orbit overpasses provide air column and ground temp data that infills station data (from 1900 onwards). There's a science to ground truthing, error detection, and data correction. Here's the gross single number continent wide average over a century: http://www.bom.gov.au/cgi-bin/climate/change/timeseries.cgi http://www.bom.gov.au/cgi-bin/climate/change/timeseries.cgi It's not hard to find raw data, finer grids, methodology, etc.
- bluGill 2y agoOnly sometimes. It is easier to measure in cities, and thus introduce bias based on whatever pavement is populate. There is a lot of data, and the people who measure this (or at least some of them) are aware of the issues and so correct for them. However you cannot just blindly apply the central limit theorem.
- defrost 2y agoWho said anything about blindly? Apart from yourself, implying that happens as a matter of course?
- defrost 2y ago> It is easier to measure in cities, and thus introduce bias based on whatever pavement is populate. That's a myth. * MODIS sat readings are available under the precessing polar orbit path and are indifferent to urbanisation or not. * National BoM networks have always included stations outside of cities and great care is taken to position stations and to normalise readings. * Urban Heat Island Bias is a myth of long standing; asked and answered three decades ago, two decades ago, a decade ago. Why is it _still_ being raised in 2025? See: https://skepticalscience.com/urban-heat-island-effect-intermediate.htm https://skepticalscience.com/urban-heat-island-effect-interm... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pidRKmq2iGI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pidRKmq2iGI
- ta20240528 2y agoIndeed, but not if your thermometer could only measure in 2°C increments. You don't gain accuracy by averaging a bunch of rough measurements, especially if the micro-climate has a lot of diversity. Statistics is tough.
- defrost 2y agoLuckily the Australian BOM Weather Station specifications require that air and soil temp sensors have a -60° C to +60° C range with a 0.1° C resolution and a ±0.1° C accuracy. The specs are in attachment 2 of the BoM Observation Specification manual. Spurious comments are easy, looking stuff up is tough.
- triknomeister 2y agoReally? That's pretty horrible understanding of stats you have there. By your logic, it makes no sense to say that the fertility rate is 1.81 and has changed by 0.8 to now be 1.73 because a woman can either give birth to 1 or 2 kids. We do measure Earth's average temperature for what it's worth and while different metrics might give different results, the absolute value is not really useful. What is useful is the change in that metric. And if our global temperatures change by 0.1C by any one metric, it is a very significant change given that the metric is well designed. And yes, it is possible to design a good metric.
- Y_Y 2y agoThe median is not the message!