Nick Owen writes: -+--------------- | ... | Or to teach pollsters to ask the correct questions. | ...
All, Mr. Owen is dead-on. Speaking as someone who has had a formal education in statistics including the design of survey instruments, I will say that of all the ways in which it is possible for the dishonest to skew the results of quantitative analysis, survey design is hands down the most vulnerable. You want the numbers to come out your way? Sure, you can manipulate any data set of numbers to lean the direction you want them to lean, but if you control the survey instrument used to collect the raw data in the first place you 0wn the analysis in ways that re-analysis by others cannot erase. Case in point: Allowing those who care about Issue XYZ to self-select whether to take your survey guarantees overweighting the tails of your distribution and in ways that you may not be able to see (such as organized survey takers who talk to each other). Sort of like an Internet-mailing-list, no? --dan --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
