Posts from May 2013 (75)

Dan Kahan, a researcher in the Cultural Cognition project at Yale Law School, has an interesting post on “the science communication problem”

The motivation behind this research has been to understand the science communication problem. The “science communication problem” (as I use this phrase) refers to the failure of valid, compelling, widely available science to quiet public controversy over risk and other policy relevant facts to which it directly speaks. The climate change debate is a conspicuous example, but there are many others

Team Ratings for Round 8

Here are the team ratings prior to Round 8, along with the ratings at the start of the season. I have created a brief description of the method I use for predicting rugby games. Go to my Department home page to see this.

Performance So Far

So far there have been 56 matches played, 37 of which were correctly predicted, a success rate of 66.07%.

Here are the predictions for last week’s games.

Predictions for Round 8

Here are the predictions for Round 8. The prediction is my estimated expected points difference with a positive margin being a win to the home team, and a negative margin a win to the away team.

Team Ratings for Round 12

This year the predictions have been slightly changed with the help of a student, Joshua Dale. The home ground advantage now is different when both teams are from the same country to when the teams are from different countries. The basic method is described on my Department home page.

Here are the team ratings prior to Round 12, along with the ratings at the start of the season.

Performance So Far

So far there have been 68 matches played, 47 of which were correctly predicted, a success rate of 69.1%.

Here are the predictions for last week’s games.

Predictions for Round 12

Here are the predictions for Round 12. The prediction is my estimated expected points difference with a positive margin being a win to the home team, and a negative margin a win to the away team.

This graph, from Public Radio International, may help illustrate why public-health people have such a different attitude to business and economics people on cigarette plain packaging

Economists worry about whether plain packaging is effective in reducing smoking, and whether the costs it imposes in New Zealand are out of proportion to the benefits. Other businesses may worry that the idea will spread.

Public health advocates are genuinely mystified by this. They regard tobacco as unique, and tobacco companies as among the common enemies of humankind, to be wiped out as expeditiously as is possible without too much collateral damage.

• For journalists, an excerpt on statistics from The Science Writers Handbook, via a post at Scientific American
•  For everyone, a new book called Naked Statistics, with an interview with the author on NPR