aknerd 
- Member since: 1/2/2010
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http://armorgames.com/community/thread/ … st-9187957
A prospective thread. Saving here so that I don't have to re-type it, should I decide to post it:
Something I've been thinking about recently: is it possible for one action to be able to cause multiple seperate (and contradicting) outcomes?
For instance, when you flip a coin, it is commonly held that you have a 50 percent of getting a heads, and a 50 percent chance of getting a tails. Now, out of all the coin flips, that might be close to the truth.
But consider just one coin flip:
1. You place a coin heads up on your right thumb.
2. You flip it, and it turns 15 times before
3. You catch it again with your right hand.
4. You place it on the back of your left hand (essentially flipping again). It is, of course, heads up.
Let's use a hypothetical time machine to prove a point. Now that we know the outcome, let's go back to the end of step four, before you take your hand away and reveal the coin. What is the chance of getting heads? 100 percent, right? Because the coin is already heads up.
So go back to step 3. Still, 100 percent of getting heads. The conditions are exactly (and I mean exactly) the same as when you "first" caught the coin. So nothing different can happen.
But now things get interesting. If we go back to step 2, does the coin still flip 15 times? When you consider all the factors that will influence the coin's flippage (amount of force transfered from thumb, wind, gravity, friction, etc), will anything be different? Theoretically, if the events preceding step 2 are exactly the same (which they are), then step 2 should procede exactly like it did the first time. It's like rewinding a DVD: the information on the DVD is still the same, so it will show the same video.
So of course, the question is: How far back do you have to go before there isn't a 100% chance of getting a heads on that particular flip?
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View all comments »MageGrayWolf says:
Posted at 10:47pm on 4/13/2013
Yeah there is a problem there. There are problems with their statistics. Found more of an article that goes over some of the issues from the host site.
"Robert Karis pointed out a miscalculation, one that gave the study's results more significance than warranted:
If our calculations are correct, the absolute difference between the control and prayer group is 0.22 in-stead of 0.30, and the relative difference is 8% rather than 10%. Assuming that the SEM [standard error of the mean] remains about 0.1, the corrected numbers would not result in a statistically significant difference between the control and prayer groups."
"Donald A. Sandweiss took issue with the statistical significance, or P value, of the results. Statistical significance is a measure of the likelihood the results show chance and not some causal relationship. P values of 0.05 or lower are usually required in clinical trials before a medicine or procedure is considered worth using. The Harris study produced a P value of 0.04."
"Sloan and Bagiella also noted that the prayer and control groups stayed the same length of time in the CCU and showed a difference only in the "unvalidated Mid American Heart Instituteâ€"Cardiac Care Unit (MAHI-CCU) scale constructed for the purpose of this study." "
There was also issue taken with the lack of consent from the patient. Though if we are just focusing on the results consent or not shouldn't have any impact on the results.
http://www.ntskeptics.org/2004/2004augu … htm#prayer
MageGrayWolf says:
Posted at 3:02am on 4/13/2013
I probably should look at this a bit more closely when I'm not dead tired. But are they taking a total average from both groups for the final score? If that's the case then the 11% difference in reduction for the prayer group can easily be accounted for by there being about 11% fewer test subjects in the prayer group.
Xzeno says:
Posted at 3:22pm on 4/11/2013
The final judging will be posted around the end of May. After that, I shall run a new summer contest, which maybe similar to or a second twiction contest. I'll be soliciting more specific input once the semester ends, but until then, if you have any writing contest likes/dislikes or things you want to see, I am actually thinking about it and yours is one of the opinions I value more strongly.
Somewhat49 says:
Posted at 3:47pm on 3/18/2013
Thought you were gone, glad to see you're still here!
MageGrayWolf says:
Posted at 3:32am on 2/26/2013
I think you deserve some props for that evolution thread you started. It's been a rather interesting read. Almost a shame more people haven't joined in, but I have to wonder how many on this forum could keep up with the discussion.