andrew_gelman_stats andrew_gelman_stats-2012 andrew_gelman_stats-2012-1190 knowledge-graph by maker-knowledge-mining
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Introduction: In old books (and occasionally new books), you see the word “Why” used to indicate a pause or emphasis in dialogue. For example, from 1952: “Why, how perfectly simple!” she said to herself. “The way to save Wilbur’s life is to play a trick on Zuckerman. “If I can fool a bug,” thought Charlotte, “I can surely fool a man. People are not as smart as bugs.” That line about people and bugs was cute, but what really jumped out at me was the “Why.” I don’t think I’ve ever ever heard anyone use “Why” in that way in conversation, but I see it all the time in books, and every time it’s jarring. What’s the deal? Is it that people used to talk that way? Or is a Wasp thing, some regional speech pattern that was captured in books because it was considered standard conversational speech? I suppose one way to learn more would be to watch a bunch of old movies. I could sort of imagine Jimmy Stewart beginning his sentences with “Why” all the time. Does anyone know more? P.S. I use
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1 In old books (and occasionally new books), you see the word “Why” used to indicate a pause or emphasis in dialogue. [sent-1, score-1.188]
2 For example, from 1952: “Why, how perfectly simple! [sent-2, score-0.112]
3 “The way to save Wilbur’s life is to play a trick on Zuckerman. [sent-4, score-0.524]
4 “If I can fool a bug,” thought Charlotte, “I can surely fool a man. [sent-5, score-0.669]
5 ” That line about people and bugs was cute, but what really jumped out at me was the “Why. [sent-7, score-0.348]
6 ” I don’t think I’ve ever ever heard anyone use “Why” in that way in conversation, but I see it all the time in books, and every time it’s jarring. [sent-8, score-0.631]
7 Or is a Wasp thing, some regional speech pattern that was captured in books because it was considered standard conversational speech? [sent-11, score-1.206]
8 I suppose one way to learn more would be to watch a bunch of old movies. [sent-12, score-0.549]
9 I could sort of imagine Jimmy Stewart beginning his sentences with “Why” all the time. [sent-13, score-0.307]
10 I used to live in the same building as the guy who discovered the etymology of O. [sent-17, score-0.522]
11 He did that around 1940 but was still around sixty years later. [sent-19, score-0.407]
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Introduction: In old books (and occasionally new books), you see the word “Why” used to indicate a pause or emphasis in dialogue. For example, from 1952: “Why, how perfectly simple!” she said to herself. “The way to save Wilbur’s life is to play a trick on Zuckerman. “If I can fool a bug,” thought Charlotte, “I can surely fool a man. People are not as smart as bugs.” That line about people and bugs was cute, but what really jumped out at me was the “Why.” I don’t think I’ve ever ever heard anyone use “Why” in that way in conversation, but I see it all the time in books, and every time it’s jarring. What’s the deal? Is it that people used to talk that way? Or is a Wasp thing, some regional speech pattern that was captured in books because it was considered standard conversational speech? I suppose one way to learn more would be to watch a bunch of old movies. I could sort of imagine Jimmy Stewart beginning his sentences with “Why” all the time. Does anyone know more? P.S. I use
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Introduction: I was asked by Sophie Roell, an editor at The Browser , where every day they ask an expert in a field to recommend the top five books, not by them, in their subject. I was asked to recommend five books on how Americans vote. The trouble is that I’m really pretty unfamiliar with the academic literature of political science, but it seemed sort of inappropriate for a political scientist such as myself to recommend non-scholarly books that I like (for example, “Style vs. Substance” by George V. Higgins, “Lies My Teacher Told Me,” by James Loewen, “The Rascal King” by Jack Beatty, “Republican Party Reptile” by P. J. O’Rourke, and, of course, “All the King’s Men,” by Robert Penn Warren). I mean, what’s the point of that? Nobody needs me to recommend books like that. Instead, I moved sideways and asked if I could discuss five books on statistics instead. Roell said that would be fine, so I sent her a quick description, which appears below. The actual interview turned out much bett
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Introduction: Eric Tassone writes: I [Tassone] had to Google “ Mary Rosh ” but remember that imbroglio now. Made my day, too. But really I wanted to write to ask you about something related to Bill James. I first encountered his works at age 13, when a baseball coach talked up his books and lent me one (that I fear I never returned). I then read his Abstracts from ’84 or ’85 until they went away, and then some of his other books in the ’90s. Anyway, my question is: Do you know if these works are available on a CD or DVD-ROM or the web something, like they do sometimes w/ collections like Mad Magazine or the New Yorker cartoons or whatever? Maybe through his website, to which I do not subscribe? (By the way, Google Books produces search results for the ’83-’87 editions, but at most just little clippings, not the full book or anything.) I wonder why we don’t see more of this, since the marginal cost of re-packaging and distributing already-created content for which there is at least some pent
Introduction: Our apartment is from earlier in the century, so I can’t give Tyler Cowen’s first answer , but, after that, I follow him in thinking of the several books I have from that decade. Beyond that, lemme think . . . We occasionally play Risk , and our set dates from the 50s. Some kitchen implements (a mixmaster, a couple of cookbooks, who knows which old bowls, forks, etc). Probably some of the furniture, although I don’t know which. Probably some of the items in our building (the boiler?) What else, I wonder? There are probably a few things I’m forgetting. 50-60 years is a long time, I guess. P.S. to the commenters: I’m taking the question to refer to things manufactured in the 1950s and not before!
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Introduction: Now that you have some free time again, you’ll have to check out these books and tell us if they’re worth reading. Claire Kirch reports : Lizzie Skurnick Books launches in September with the release of Debutante Hill by Lois Duncan. The novel, which was originally published by Dodd, Mead, in 1958, has been out of print for about three decades. The other books on the initial list, all reissues, are A Long Day in November by Ernest J. Gaines (originally published in 1971), Happy Endings Are All Alike by Sandra Scoppettone (1979), I’ll Love You When You’re More Like Me by M.E. Kerr (1977), Secret Lives by Berthe Amoss (1979), To All My Fans, With Love, From Sylvie by Ellen Conford (1982), and Me and Fat Glenda by Lila Perl (1972). . . . Noting that many of the books of that era beloved by teen boys are still in print – such as Isaac Asimov’s novels and The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier – Skurnick pointed out that, in contrast, many of the books that were embraced by teen gir
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Introduction: In old books (and occasionally new books), you see the word “Why” used to indicate a pause or emphasis in dialogue. For example, from 1952: “Why, how perfectly simple!” she said to herself. “The way to save Wilbur’s life is to play a trick on Zuckerman. “If I can fool a bug,” thought Charlotte, “I can surely fool a man. People are not as smart as bugs.” That line about people and bugs was cute, but what really jumped out at me was the “Why.” I don’t think I’ve ever ever heard anyone use “Why” in that way in conversation, but I see it all the time in books, and every time it’s jarring. What’s the deal? Is it that people used to talk that way? Or is a Wasp thing, some regional speech pattern that was captured in books because it was considered standard conversational speech? I suppose one way to learn more would be to watch a bunch of old movies. I could sort of imagine Jimmy Stewart beginning his sentences with “Why” all the time. Does anyone know more? P.S. I use
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Introduction: I saw the trailer for the new Mr. Peabody movie and it looked terrible. They used that weird animation where everything looks round, also the voice had none of the intonations of the “real” Peabody (for some reason, the trailer had the original English voices, maybe they didn’t get their act together to make a dubbed trailer in time for the release here), also the scenes looked pretty stupid. I went back home and checked out Peabody on wikipedia and it turns out that they made 91 episodes! I had no idea. Anyway, here’s my real question: Why bother making a Mr. Peabody movie if you’re not going to do it well? I understand that lots of moviemakers are hacks and there will always be a huge audience for crap in any case, so I’m certainly not demanding that all movies be “good” (in whatever sense that means, from my perceptions). But there are lots and lots of opportunities to make crap movies, there are a million toys and video games and comic book characters and fairy tales and br
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Introduction: I recently had the occasion to reread my review of The Black Swan, from April 2007. It was fun reading my review (and also this pre-review ; “nothing useful escapes from a blackbody,” indeed). It was like a greatest hits of all my pet ideas that I’ve never published. Looking back, I realize that Taleb really was right about a lot of things. Now that the financial crisis has happened, we tend to forget that the experts who Taleb bashes were not always reasonable at all. Here’s what I wrote in my review, three and a half years ago: On page 19, Taleb refers to the usual investment strategy (which I suppose I actually use myself) as “picking pennies in front of a steamroller.” That’s a cute phrase; did he come up with it? I’m also reminded of the famous Martingale betting system. Several years ago in a university library I came across a charming book by Maxim (of gun fame) where he went through chapter after chapter demolishing the Martingale system. (For those who don’t kno
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Introduction: I, like Steve Hsu , I too would love to read a definitive biography of John von Neumann (or, as we’d say in the U.S., “John Neumann”). I’ve read little things about him in various places such as Stanislaw Ulam’s classic autobiography, and two things I’ve repeatedly noticed are: 1. Neumann comes off as a obnoxious, self-satisfied jerk. He just seems like the kind of guy I wouldn’t like in real life. 2. All these great men seem to really have loved the guy. It’s hard for me to reconcile two impressions above. Of course, lots of people have a good side and a bad side, but what’s striking here is that my impressions of Neumann’s bad side come from the very stories that his friends use to demonstrate how lovable he was! So, yes, I’d like to see the biography–but only if it could resolve this paradox. Also, I don’t know how relevant this is, but Neumann shares one thing with the more-lovable Ulam and the less-lovable Mandelbrot: all had Jewish backgrounds but didn’t seem to
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Introduction: Someone points me to this report from Tilburg University on disgraced psychology researcher Diederik Stapel. The reports includes bits like this: When the fraud was first discovered, limiting the harm it caused for the victims was a matter of urgency. This was particularly the case for Mr Stapel’s former PhD students and postdoctoral researchers . . . However, the Committees were of the opinion that the main bulk of the work had not yet even started. . . . Journal publications can often leave traces that reach far into and even beyond scientific disciplines. The self-cleansing character of science calls for fraudulent publications to be withdrawn and no longer to proliferate within the literature. In addition, based on their initial impressions, the Committees believed that there were other serious issues within Mr Stapel’s publications . . . This brought into the spotlight a research culture in which this sloppy science, alongside out-and-out fraud, was able to remain undetected
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Introduction: Obit here . I think I have a cousin with the same last name as this guy, so maybe we’re related by marriage in some way. (By that standard we’re also related to Marge Simpson and, I seem to recall, the guy who wrote the scripts for Dark Shadows.)
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Introduction: Lyric Semiconductor posted: For over 60 years, computers have been based on digital computing principles. Data is represented as bits (0s and 1s). Boolean logic gates perform operations on these bits. A processor steps through many of these operations serially in order to perform a function. However, today’s most interesting problems are not at all suited to this approach. Here at Lyric Semiconductor, we are redesigning information processing circuits from the ground up to natively process probabilities: from the gate circuits to the processor architecture to the programming language. As a result, many applications that today require a thousand conventional processors will soon run in just one Lyric processor, providing 1,000x efficiencies in cost, power, and size. Om Malik has some more information, also relating to the team and the business. The fundamental idea is that computing architectures work deterministically, even though the world is fundamentally stochastic.
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Introduction: Jenny Anderson reports on a discussion of the practice of colleges preferential admission of children of alumni: [Richard] Kahlenberg citing research from his book “Affirmative Action for the Rich: Legacy Preferences in College Admissions” made the case that getting into good schools matters — 12 institutions making up less than 1 percent of the U.S. population produced 42 percent of government leaders and 54 percent of corporate leaders. And being a legacy helps improve an applicant’s chances of getting in, with one study finding that being a primary legacy — the son or daughter of an undergraduate alumnus or alumna — increases one’s chance of admission by 45.1 percent. I’d call that 45 percent but I get the basic idea. But then Jeffrey Brenzel of the Yale admissions office replied: “We turn away 80 percent of our legacies, and we feel it every day,” Mr. Brenzel said, adding that he rejected more offspring of the school’s Sterling donors than he accepted this year (
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