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maia comments on Moderate alcohol consumption inversely correlated with all-cause mortality - Less Wrong Discussion

1 Post author: michaelcurzi 11 July 2012 05:41PM

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Comment author: maia 16 July 2012 06:48:04PM *  4 points [-]

'Statistically significant' refers to a specific criterion of falsifiability that doesn't apply to your statement as phrased. You could invent a metric to make your claim more easily falsifiable: for example, "My happiness measured on a scale of 1-10 will decrease if I drink X amount of alcohol per day" is a testable claim, and having tested it, you could examine the results for statistical significance. But just adding the word 'statistical' to your sentence doesn't make it a quantitatively falsifiable claim.