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IlyaShpitser comments on Dancing room for you and applied problems in foreign fields - Less Wrong
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Comments (20)
Not sure why the word rationality appears in your post.
I can't tell how much of your problem is designing the study, and how much is analyzing data someone already collected. Can't you talk to a statistician at your Uni?
Well of course if I wanted real contribution I would have written a far more specific research proposal, but in our institute there are no statisticians I know of:)
I was wondering, actually, what difference is there between posing a problem to a statistician and to a broadly educated 'rationalist'. If rationalists think they should win, then why do they only win in some narrow lanes of life? There's plenty about fighting akrasia on LW, which is, however much impact it might have in one's life, a small-scale issue. There's plenty of AI discussion, which is giant-scale. Examples of middle-scale things I can remember without looking are Meal squares and something about one LWer setting up a business to help others find work in Australia. Thus the strange post:)
If the statistician is competent, he has a specialized toolset and the necessary skills to use it -- something that a generalist usually lacks.
The question is similar to "what's the difference between complaining about some pain to a doctor and to a broadly educated rationalist".
Moreover, stats is one of those fields where "A little knowledge is a dangerous thing" applies in spades...
Rationalist record with stats isn't that great, imo. Stats isn't so easy to learn...