True. But of the statements themselves, one is more apt to be true than the other. Let’s turn it around:
Woman X was, in fact, raped and she filled out a report.
For every 100 women raped, 99 will be white and 1 will be black.
Can you tell me if Woman X is more likely to be white or black?
Thanks. Maybe I’ll go back and delve into that later. I took a gander at it last night and my eyes started to spin, as I am only passingly familiar with BI.
DMC, you with the face,
Right now I’m going to sign off and leave to go to either the gym or Sierra Leone. I guess that means that you have no idea of where I’m going, right?
See you…whenever… 
So what? More people win company party door prizes than win the lotto. It only appears that the rape claims are linked, but they aren’t. Janice’s chances of being raped exist separately from Marie’s.
I was refering to the hypothetical that I presented in the OP.
Yes I do. There are more people who win company party door prizes than win the lotto. But so what?
We also have info that says any given black woman is more likely to have been raped than any given white women, which using your logic would make the black woman more credible. What we don’t have is any information that tells us that black or white women lie about being raped at rates that differ between the two groups, nor that women are more likely to lie about interracial rape than same-race rape. Basically, we can cherry pick which statistic we want to use and arrive at any conclusion we want using your method. Are you reaching the conclusion you want?
Actually, using your logic we can tell. Far more people have been to Columbus than have been to Cincinnati, so according to you, the one who claims “Cincinatti” is less credible. Many of us disagree with this.
The problem is that the statement “absence of any other information” is causing people to immediately assign a default equal rate of reporting these rapes while maintaining a significant discrepancy in the actual number.
Choosing the “equal” distribution is arbitrary yet it is 1 of the 2 numbers used to establish the ratio of actual to total reports which in turn is used to judge the “credibility” or accuracy of the statement for each person. Basically, if you get rid of the words and just put it in numbers you have something like the following:
Ratio R1: 100/D1
Ratio R2: 1/D2
Because we don’t know what D1 and D2 are, let’s make them both equal, and in this case 200.
Now we have:
R1=100/200
R2=1/200
Wow, r2 sure is lower than r1, that person’s statement is less credible.
Some might argue that, no this assumed equal distribution of reporting is not actually happening, but it is. The only way 1 statement can be more credible is if it is possible that one or both of the statement is false. Given that we have allowed for a false statement, the only measure of accuracy is false vs total claims. And given that one statement is assumed more credible, that means it’s ratio of false vs credible claims is higher than the other. And finally, the “absence of other information” implies we don’t have unique reporting rates, but unfortunately, we still need a reporting rate to determine the accuracy rate, even if it’s only relative to the other rate.
I am sorry if it seemed I had dropped out of this thread, I periodically checked in throughout the weekend, but never got an opportunity to read it all and give a response. I’m going to address an earlier post by you with the face.
We are not saying that one person is a liar, we are not declaring that they are lying, the only declaration being made is which claim is more credible.
In a case such as that I would have to assess if Harry’s propensity to tell the truth far outweighed the absurdity of his claim.
The whole point of that example was trying to help you see that a claim can be considered unlikely, without taking into account the credibility of a claimant’s honesty. You may believe Harry’s story, since he never told a lie in his life, but that doesn’t make his claim any more outragous. In that example though, there is outstanding information to take into account, in the the original scenario that information wasn’t available. Therefore, the only way you can deduce which story is more credible, is from the credibility of the story itself. It’s that simple.
Why must credibility of a person be established before you can make any assumption on the credibility of a story, especially in the case where there is no way to determine the credibility of a person. If a man on the street came up to you and said he had an alien living in his ear, you would be completely unwilling to make a judgement on that story without knowing the man’s life story and history? You would (I hope) have serious doubts that this story is true. This is not a statement attesting that the man is a liar.
There is no bias whatsoever, I don’t believe someone is lying just because the story is unlikely. I am not predetermined to think Harry is a liar because his story is not very credible, I am not predetermined to think his story is credible because he’s always told the truth in the past. I am taking the story simply on it’s merits and making an educated guess on whether or not it is likely.
The only bias taking place in this thread is you being biased against the possibility you may be wrong. I have a very strong feeling that if race wasn’t involved in the original situation you wouldn’t be so predisposed to not even looking at points the other side has stated, as you have shown repeatedly by debating varying topics that were not even a part of the discussion to begin with.
Which is why numerous times it has been said that you should not judge a case like this in real life, please read the thread, or can you not be “arsed” to read a thread your participating in either? You may be correct regarding the problems with the justice system, however if that’s the bone your trying to pick by debating this, your barking up the wrong tree ma’am.
If your going to insist on straw man debating tactics, arguing points that were not involved in the issue, and disregarding anything and everything other people have to say on the subject (aside from those who you think are agreeing with you, even if they really aren’t), I’m going to have to agree with magellan01 and say let’s move on. It is becoming more and more apparent as this thread progresses that your idea of an intellectual victory will be through out and out persistence and longevity by reiterating your “points”, false as they may be, and simply waiting until others have moved on to other threads. Keep it up, soon enough others will tire of banging their head against a brick wall, and you can sleep at night under the facade of debating superiority and that you emerged righteous with your blind morals still intact.
For me, the only time that would apply is if the claim is based on something that is implausible, not simply uncommon. If you said that you saw a ghost, a flying monkey, or talking gorilla, then I would find those things too incredible to believe without some unshakeable evidence. But that’s not an assessment based on probability. Can you compute the odds of there being a talking gorilla? Are there any stats on the prevalence of flying monkeys? Of course not. So my skepticism clearly is based on your claim going completely against the my beliefs about the way the world works. It’s not based on it simply being uncommon.
I don’t find being slapped in the face by an elephant as being all that outrageous, frankly. Call me crazy, but that would be completely plausible if Harry was standing right in front of an elephant. I’d need to hear a little bit more about his story before finding it incredible.
Again, there’s a big difference between something being implausible because it goes against the world we know, and something simply being uncommon. If someone said they saw an alien, the first question that would come to my mind would NOT be “Wow, what’s the chances of that happening?” It would be, “Geeze, what is this guy smoking?” See how my initial impression still falls back on the credibility of the person making the claim, not the “rareness” of the alleged event? If that same person said they saw an Australian Aboriginee buying a slice a pizza from a street vendor in NY city, I would believe them if I had no reason to think they’d lie to me. But what are the chances of this person seeing an Aboriginee all the way in NY city? That certainly doesn’t happen everyday, right?
So if you don’t question Harry’s credibility and you think he’s being as truthful as he’s always been, do you believe his story? I’m just trying to figure out how you process the information he’s just told you, if you don’t believe it.
What is this supposed to mean? Honestly, what’s the point of this ad hominem? Surely you agree that we wouldn’t be having this conversation if the main point of difference between the Duke accuser and the lacrosse players had been something other than race? Not because I’m so fixated on race, but because no one would have thought to apply pseudo-Bayesian reasoning to the accuser’s credibility. If the Duke accuser was of recent Polish descent and all the lacrosse players were Anglos, I guarrantee you that no one would have asked if there were DoJ stats on the prevalence of this type of crime. If the Duke accuser was Catholic and all the players were Protestants, that difference would have been regarded as completely irrelevant to the question of credibility. It is only because race seems more significant than it is, that we’ve had to have multiple threads on this subject.
But with all the scenarios you have cooked up, I’ve been able to argue against just the same as the rape hypotheticals. Because it’s not the race thing that bothers me. It’s the illogic in conjunction with the stringent defense of such illogic. Now why that bothers you, I don’t know. And I’m not going to suddenly start agreeing with you just to convince you that I’m not bothered by how race has been treated in these trainwreck threads, either.
Okay, if you can’t apply anything that you’re saying to real life, then why bother going through all these lengths to defend it? I think the fact that I can apply everything that I’m saying to real world events while you admit that you can not, speaks volumes. It makes as much sense as a nutritionist writing a book about the ins and outs of a good diet, and then in the last paragraph of the last page, adding “don’t try this at home”. This is laughable, Brandon. You might as well have joined the earlier discussion about dragons instead of called me out for being wrong.
How wrong can I really be if all your opinions about this subject are useless–and possibily unethical–in practice?
Well, I for one am glad that before you are called to judge a case, you are able to shut off the part of your brain that leads you to believe a claim’s credibility depends more on how frequently it occurs moreso than the credibility of the claimant. But excuse me for not having faith that every potential juror who has holds your theory is the same way.
I’m very curious to find out if the claims of rare events happening really are less likely to be accurate. It’s entirely possible the opposite is the case.
Although I truly believe that mathematically you can’t judge the statements if you have no other information (which includes information about human nature, our fallible brains, etc.).
But if we do introduce the implied variables of human nature and all of our reasons for making an incorrect claim, the question remains:
Do humans make false claims of rare events at a higher rate than false claims of frequent events?
Anybody know of any studies?
It’s interesting to consider this thread in the light of the plagiarism thread currently in MPSIMS. There’s no proof that the students actually do copy work off the Internet - it’s not an impossibility that they should happen to produce something that closely resembles someone else’s work by a mere coincidence - but presumably those students that get nailed for plagiarism don’t necessarily have a track record for lying, either. I suppose you just have to consider the probability that an assignment that’s been handed in might actually have been copied from an earlier one that it is shown to look like.
I agree - it’s time to let this go. I’ve been on a lot of internet discussion boards and I’ve never seen anyone so persistently cling to the wrong side of an argument after being shown a hundred different ways why he or she was wrong. Often it’s peoples’ very incompetence that blinds them to their own incompetence. I suspect that’s the case with you with the face.
Here’s an interesting study:
http://www.apa.org/journals/features/psp7761121.pdf
And an article about the study:
[QUOTE=psychloan]
I agree - it’s time to let this go. I’ve been on a lot of internet discussion boards and I’ve never seen anyone so persistently cling to the wrong side of an argument after being shown a hundred different ways why he or she was wrong.**.I agree. It’s probably time for you to let it go.
One would imagine that if you were really well-versed in Bayesian statistical reasoning, you would be able to explain your thinking more clearly and completely. Instead, you seem to have a little knowledge of the matter, which as we all know is a dangerous thing. Pointing at your mathematical post and jumping up and down saying SHOW ME WHERE I’M WRONG was just not convincing.
It took another poster to even begin to explain what you meant. Whether that is appropriate to the question is still a dubious position, and ultimately doesn’t move the ball any further than when we started.
All you’ve really done is suggest that we assign a constant to the rate of lying in the general population. Then we take the numerator for each category and add that constant, and divide that sum by the new total within each category.
So, rather than making the argument based on the probability as specified by the rate of occurrence within the population, you are suggesting that we base the argument on a comparison of those same rates plus a constant. The argument hasn’t changed, it’s just the denominator that has.
But in the process, you’ve specified that the probabilities that any pair of representatives from each category is lying are the same. That, I take as the answer to the initial question, which was as I understood it, given a black woman and a white woman making a report of rape, which is more likely to be lying?
May I kindly suggest that you take your smarmy links and embed them firmly in your rectum. You’ve no cause to be looking down on anyone here, little one.
You guys are so funny. In the other thread, you know the one you started psychloan your numbers, methods and conclusions have pretty much been debunked. I noticed you haven’t returned there to defend them or to respond to the questions asked of you.
Instead you come here, slinging arrows of incompetence at YWTF, as you did with Hentor earlier. What about RaftPeople, DMC,**Noel Prosequi ** or ultrafilter?
Pehaps you need to look in freaking mirror man, before you start hurling insults. BTW, if you don’t see Abe Lincoln reflection behind, then I suggest he’s not a Zombie, but a Vampire…what are the odds of that?
Honest Abe, King of the Undead.
Funny you should say that. We’re all still waiting to see what kind of magical maths was behind your stupid statement in the LW thread.
Shall I repeat it a third time for the audience at home? I think I shall.
I have a strong feeling that not even you can tap dance around the stupidity of this statement. Which is why we haven’t heard you defend it.
Nope. I just got tired of getting nowhere. Re-check the thread: You asked me a series of questions about my example. I answered them all. You refused to acknowledge that I had shown my position to be correct and instead shifted grounds.
BYEEEE.
[QUOTE=Hentor the Barbarian]
The problem is not that my explanation is unclear. The problem is that your thinking is unclear. This prevents you from seeing the truth or realizing that you’re wrong.
Guess psycholan’s a punk too, then.
[QUOTE=psychloan]
Thought you were leaving. BYEEEEEE
[QUOTE=Ensign Edison]
I’m not responding to you with the face anymore.
[QUOTE=psychloan]
Yes. My thinking has prevented me from realizing that I am wrong. Got me there.
But the truth is out there!
[QUOTE=Ensign Edison]
As opposed to not participating and then trying to sound like one of the boys after a hard slog?
Here is the full extent of your contribution (other than the brilliance cited above) to this long and interesting thread, which many people have put a great deal of thought and effort into:
Post #251:
Post #375:
That’s it. Two prior posts, neither of which even hints of you taking a position, never mind explaining or defending it. There’s not even a comment on the subject of the thread. :rolleyes:
Do you realize what a punk that makes you look like?