Comment by bnegreve | Hacker News Reader

Comment by bnegreve | Hacker News Reader

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> The guy is a vile idiot of the worst kind: ignorant and aggressive.

Your comment is a bit irritating. I don't know the author of this blog post but I think he has a couple of valid points. You seem to dislike him for some other reasons. Feel free to share them. The blog post is still perfectly reasonable.

Anyway, I agree some of your comments as well, namely this:

> I can give hundreds when std dev is useful and mean deviation isn't. Anything when you decide what % of yoru bankroll to bet on perceived edge for example.

and this:

> Guess what though, taking the squares have a purpose: it penalizes big deviations so two situations which have the same mean deviation but one is more stable have different standard deviations.

But I don't see why this comment from N.T. is stupid:

>>>It is all due to a historical accident: in 1893, the great Karl Pearson introduced the term "standard deviation" for what had been known as "root mean square error". The confusion started then: people thought it meant mean deviation.

I actually agree that standard deviation is a confusing name, why do you think that's a stupid comment?

>Your comment is a bit irritating. I don't know the author of this blog post but I think he has a couple of valid points. You seem to dislike him for some other reasons. Feel free to share them. The blog post is still perfectly reasonable.

Really ? You think call for substituting one of the most common use measures in science, finance, gambling etc. with some other measure which doesn't have the same crucial properties without giving any examples of one going wrong and the other being better is reasonable ? He also threw some assertions about general confusion and scientist using it because of misunderstanding in 1893. Again without any example while giving condescending analogy of someone asking you to calculating average and realizing it's not standard deviation. It's not reasonable by any standard. The reason I have very low opinion about his writing and him are his books, especially Antifragile.

>I actually agree that standard deviation is a confusing name, why do you think that's a stupid comment?

He claimed that "the confusion", things he described in previous paragraphs about scientists, PhD's and statisticians is caused by misleading name. I am not saying the name is good but implying that so many people are using it just because the name given to it in 1893 is insulting. It's basically Taleb telling scientists: "hey guys, you use this standard deviation thing because of randomish reason and not because you know what you are doing". It's very strong bold statement which undermines credibility of whole groups of scientists which he again didn't even begin to argue for. He just asserts it and continue.

Why this attitude? Simply because it's 'insulting'? Is it true? Should you not be far more concerned if it's true? That lots of scientists are misusing statistical tools? What does it say about you that you are posting angry vitriolic comments online because someone called out scientists misusing statistical tools but that you are not as alarmed that such a thing could be happening?

>Simply because it's 'insulting'?

Because he makes a lot of bold/insulting claims and then fails to give one argument most of the time. When he does provide an argument it's very often nonsense (like with his analogy of someone being asked to calculate MAD).

>Should you not be far more concerned if it's true?

I am. I am also concerned about discrediting scientists without providing reasons. Creationism, anti-vaccination and climate change denial are all based on people not trusting scientists and following guys who just tell them scienc is nonsense. Taleb is very close to that line.

> What does it say about you that you are posting angry vitriolic comments online because someone called out scientists misusing statistical tools but that you are not as alarmed that such a thing could be happening?

He didn't call out anybody. He just threw plain insults without reasons. When you call out someone you say what is wrong with what they are doing, like this: "Hey, bankers, it's unfair that you make huge bets and don't pay out when you lose!", "Hey, investing firms, it's stupid that you treat a lucky few as celebrities while you can't have any confidence in their performance". Here is didn't called out people. He just asserted they are using one of the most used mathematical tools incorrectly, that it's because confusion in naming and that it should be disposed of. He didn't give one example of mistakes happening because of it. Now, people who follow him and believe that he is some kind of authority may start distrusting science or academia (as he is actively hostile vs both) exactly the same way anti-vaccination people do: just because some celebrity told them so. There is value in calling people like him out on their nonsense.

...people not trusting scientists...

I'm not sure why it took you so long to flip the bozo bit (if you were attempting to dance asymptotically along the edge it really has been a bravura performance!), but that did it.

So your argument is that if large groups of scientists are misunderstanding and misusing a scientific tool nobody should try to assert or argue that this is happening without providing exceptional proof since otherwise it might insult their credibility?

Alright...

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