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1 point by light_hue_1 9 months ago | parent | context | prev | next [–] | on: General belief in a just world is associated with …

Correlation doesn’t equal causation > > For example, here are some weird correlations of no real significance This is an nonsense take on science. Your two statements are totally unrelated to one another and mean completely different things mathematically.

Those graphs with “weird” correlations were generated backwards. They had data and looked for lines that look similar. Scientific studies are generated forwards (usually, let’s not talk about retrospective studies which tend to produce junk “science”). We have a hypothesis we manipulate it and we see if there is an association.

If you write down the math for these two scenarios they are completely different statistically!

In one, you’re always going to find another pretty line to match if you have data. It means nothing!

In the other, the likelihood of two things being correlated in your experiment when they are totally unrelated to one another is very low (assuming your experiment is designed well). The question is generally, what is the path from the variable I manipulated to the effect, not “random stuff happens, lets forget about science and live in this cave now.”

So please stop saying “Correlation doesn’t equal causation” it’s nonsense that “smart” people repeat and then link to that website without understanding what’s happening.

That website doesn’t debunk science, where we run experiments without knowing the results. It debunks charlatans and liars that say “X looks like Y so they must be correlated”. That’s not what we do in science.