From: Harvey Newstrom (mail@HarveyNewstrom.com)
Date: Fri Aug 10 2001 - 13:40:00 MDT
Mike Lorrey wrote,
> Wrong. If the statistics say that, say, 10% of blacks commit crime while
> only 1% of whites do, then it is a reasonable assumption to say that any
> individual black person is ten times more likely to commit crime than
> any white person, all other factors being equal.
This is just plain wrong. Any freshman course on statistics will teach that
this is wrong. I am white. Do I have 1% chance of committing a crime?
Charles Manson was white. So was Hitler. Do they all have the same chance
of committing a crime? We cannot deduce anything about any individual based
on their race. All whites added together might add up to a 1% crime rate,
but you have no information about the percent chance of any individual
committing a crime.
> Any given coin flip DOES have a 50-50 chance of being heads or tails.
If you really want to predict a single coin flip, you would have to say that
it's chances of being heads (or alternatively tails) would be 50% with an
error of plus or minus 50%. That is from 0 to 100%. There is no
information here about any individual coin toss. If it's heads, was the
statistics right? If it's tails, was the statistics right? Can anything
happen with one coin toss to affirm or refute the statistic? No. One coin
toss is totally unfalsifiable. It cannot be tested. There is no data.
There is no predictive information. The outcome cannot be said to be
accurate or inaccurate. The statistic cites has no connection with any
individual coin toss. Even after the result of one coin toss is known, it
does not say anything about the statistics.
Average statistical numbers are only applicable to large groups with a
bell-curve distribution and a random distribution. Statistics are defined
as being invalid when applied to smaller groups, nonrandom groups, or
individuals.
You cannot say that any individual black is more likely to commit a crime
than any individual white. You do not have any information about these two
people. One may be a serial killer while the other is a choir boy. The
racial statistics above and their individual racial memberships are not
connected. There is no predictive value for any specific individual. This
is a common misunderstanding of statistics.
> Weather prediction is far more accurate the more you know about weather.
> Saying that clouds don't cause rain and that its wrong to accuse them of
> causing rain, AND wrong to conduct scientific research to find out what
> DOES cause rain is itself wrong. Saying it is racist to conclude from
> scientific study that clouds cause rain is wrong and simply politically
> correct thinking.
I would never say this. My definition of racism does not depend on whether
I believe in it or not. Something should be categorized objectively as
racist or not racist by whether it matches a defined criteria. My
evaluation that racism is bad, or someone else's evaluation that racism is
good should not influence our objective categorization.
-- Harvey Newstrom <http://HarveyNewstrom.com> <http://Newstaff.com>
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