"Jay Warner" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message news:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > Rushing in where angles fear to tread...... > > The reported/calculated p-values are valid (if at all) _only_ inasmuch as the > core assumptions regarding data are maintained. Critical evaluation of the > validity of those assumptions spell the difference between simplistic and > useful applications of p-values. > > I don't think that is the issue at hand. > > One of the things that fascinates me about "statistics" is the way that an > apparently straightforward concrete question slides over to heavy philosophical > abstractions before we even notice. ------------------------------------------------------------- You hit the nail on the head, Jay. Of interest is some of the philosophical issues around "confidence interval". David Salsburg in his book "The Lady Tasring Tea", brings out some of the arguments that surfaced at the Royal Society meeting when ....(I can't remember his name)..first presented the concept. In essense, confidence intervals are not "probability". Read his book!!!! -----------------------------------------------------------. > Is there such a thing as an operational > definition of "probability" when it is applied to an observed average from a > population with a different hypothesized mean? And if not, are we guilty of > logical presumptions on the order of Newton's fixed cartesian reference frame? ---------------------------------------------------------- There appears to be a strong motivation to encase any mathematical function that comes out to a value between 0 and 1 as a "probability". Within the human understanding of "probability" it appears that the structure is fairly coarse, such that a probability scale in terms of a non-linear Lickert 5 point scale would be adequate. Seems we pretty well understand p values above and below 0.5, and very poorly understand values near 0 and 1. This is why the "philosophic" aspects of probability are so fasenating, since it involves a mathematical expression in terms of the human ability to understand------DAHeiser
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