Ron Bloom writes:
>Why do canned software packages
>quote so many different statistics whose
>intrinsic tendencies towards "significance"
>or non-significance are obviously correlated
>with each other. Is it because folklore
>somehow plays a large part in what the
>"right test is" ?
This is a general trait for most software, not just statistical software.
The vendors want to attract the largest number of customers possible, so
they throw in everything and the kitchen sink. Look at all the features in
your word processor. Do you even use 10% of them? But everybody uses a
different 10%, so cutting back on any specific feature will get some of the
customer base upset.
With statistical software, it leads to confusion, especially if too many
options are included by default. In fact, some software (e.g., SPSS) will
not allow me to turn off certain options that I don't like. This
embarrassing when I have to say "ignore this plot" or "ignore this line of
output". Ideally, I should edit the output, but I don't always have time.
I have a bad joke about statistical software. I mention a certain software
package and say that it is so wonderful. The best part is that it allows you
to run ten different tests of the same hypothesis and then you can pick the
test with the smallest p-value.
Steve Simon, [EMAIL PROTECTED], Standard Disclaimer.
STATS - Steve's Attempt to Teach Statistics: http://www.cmh.edu/stats
=================================================================
Instructions for joining and leaving this list and remarks about
the problem of INAPPROPRIATE MESSAGES are available at
http://jse.stat.ncsu.edu/
=================================================================
