Sturla, I am working in the healthcare and seeing people loves to use excel / spss as database or statistical tool without know what he/she is doing. However, that is not the fault of excel/spss itself but of people who is using it. Things, even include SAS/R, would look stupid, when it has been misused.
In the hospitals, people don't pray God. They pray MD. :-) On 30 Dec 2006 19:09:59 -0800, sturlamolden <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Stef Mientki wrote: > > > I always thought that SPSS or SAS where thé standards. > > Stef > > As far as SPSS is a standard, it is in the field of "religious use of > statistical procedures I don't understand (as I'm a math retard), but > hey p<0.05 is always significant (and any other value is proof of the > opposite ... I think)." > > SPSS is often used by scientists that don't understand maths at all, > often within the fields of social sciences, but regrettably also within > biology and medicine. I know of few program that have done so much harm > as SPSS. It's like handing an armed weapon to a child. Generally one > should stay away from the things that one don't understand, > particularly within medicine where a wrong result can have dramatic > consequences. SPSS encourages the opposite. Copy and paste from Excel > to SPSS is regrettably becoming the de-facto standard in applied > statistics. The problem is not the quality of Excel or SPSS, but rather > the (in)competence of those conducting the data analysis. This can and > does regrettably lead to serious misinterpretation of the data, in > either direction. When a paper is submitted, these errors are usually > not caught in the peer review process, as peer review is, well, exactly > what is says: *peer* review. > > Thus, SPSS makes it easy to shoot your self in the foot. In my > experience students in social sciences and medicine are currently > thought to do exact that, in universities and colleges all around the > World. And it is particularly dangerous within medical sciences, as > peoples' life and health may be affected by it. I pray God something is > done to prohibit or limit the use of these statistical toys. > > > Sturla Molden > PhD > > -- > http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list > -- WenSui Liu A lousy statistician who happens to know a little programming (http://spaces.msn.com/statcompute/blog) -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
