DIYbanter - View Single Post - OT - Senate Republicans vote to kill Obama's jobs bill..Why DoRepublicans Hate America?

Hawke[_3_]

On 11/1/2011 12:47 PM, wrote:

While the bulk of the discussion will probably be directed towards
small-scale "home" shops, industrial/production discussions are also
quite welcome.

--
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Mike Graham | Metalworker by trade
mikegraham at sprint dot ca | Weld to live, like to weld.
Caledon, Ontario, Canada | Weird by nature
http://metalmangler.homepage.com
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
"By Fire and Iron doth he make Bread."

First thing I notice is: Make Graham...metalworker by trade. Hmmm,
didn't I say something about tradesmen being members here?

Still a mistake in how to apply statistics. The group does not
represent the general public. As just one example, this newsgroup is
almost all male. The general public is not.

That's a mistake, by the way. Gender is not a disqualifier as to being a
representative of the general public. In fact both sexes are members of
the general public. Men can be used as representatives of the general
public. It just depends on what you are trying to find out and how you
weight the data.

If it
was an engineering group I'd expect most people would have college
degrees. Assuming most people here are metal working related workers I
think it's a fair assumption that most people in this group don't have
degrees. 75% of the public has no college degree. If we are
representative of that population then most people here don't have a
degree. If we are representative of metalworkers in general then you
would expect that population to be less well educated than the general
public.

Ah but we are not representative of metalworkers in general. We are a
bunch of people who have a hobby of metalworking and like to discuss
metalworking. And I do not know where you get the idea that
machinists are less educated that the general public.

Personal experience for one and the fact that machinists are
tradespeople and they are not as highly educated as the general public
is. I spent many years going to college and that goes back to the 1970s.
I never ran into anyone there who was a machinist. If you were a
professional machinist what college degree would you pursue? I mean if
you had a profession why would you be in college unless you wanted out
of it and into something else?

My belief is that machinists are more educated than the general
public. You yourself have said you do not post about metalworking
because you do not know much about metalworking. And you probably did
not meet any machinists because very few would be taking Political
Science classes. Did you take many computer courses? If you had you
might have run across machinists learning CNC. That is where the
machinists would be found trying to keep up with the state of the art
in computer control.

Beliefs are one thing. To know is another, which is why we do research.
You have a belief and if you want to find out if it's true or not then
you get into the area of hypothesis testing. Your hypothesis; that
machinists are more educated than the general public would be exactly
the kind of thing social science research would try to find out. But you
would need to do the research before you could say your belief is
anything but that. You could test that hypothesis and get a better idea
if it's true or not but that is where the statistics come in.

My idea that tradespeople are less educated is based on statistics. I'm
fairly sure that high school educated men and tradesmen have less in the
way of college education than does the general public. I wouldn't bet my
life on that but I'm pretty sure. I'm also sure those statistics are
available and have been done already by someone. It's just a matter of
finding them.

It really does not bother me that you express opinions, whatever they
are. I do try to point out to you where you make logical errors.
Such as the one above on statistics.

To make a charge that I've made a statistical error you have to prove
it. But you don't have a clue how many people here have college degrees.
You just made a guess. OTOH, I estimated based on education level
statistics how many people here should have a college education. If you
think I am wrong then I say show me that more than 50% of the people
here have a degree in something.

The error you made was assuming that the folks that post in RCM are
representative of the general public. But they are not. Just the
fact that they post in a newsgroup means they are different from the
general public.

No that's wrong. My assumption wasn't that members here are
representative of the general public. I said the members here are less
likely to have a degree than the general public. You can disprove my
assertion by simply proving that more than 25% of the people in this
group have a college degree. I doubt you can do that though.

I would question your assumptions here. First off, I don't see why
people in RCM are not representative of the general public. If so, in
what way, and where is your proof? Second, in what way are people that
post to a newsgroup different from the public? How do you know that?

One the people in RCM are nearly all men unlike the general
population. Two most of them are computer literate, unlike a lot of
the general population. Three they are interested in metalworking.
Four a significant percentage are retired.

If anything the fact everyone is male means it's more likely that they
don't have a college degree because the majority of people graduating
from college in the last decade are females. Also retired men that are
in their 60s or older also probably don't have a degree. Simply being
computer savvy enough to be in a newsgroup doesn't indicate any high
level of education either. So I think your assumptions are just that.
They're not backed up by the facts or by reason. They're just your
personal theories.

I do not have to prove how many people here have college degrees to
know you made an error,

Then how else would you know I made an error?

You made an error you in your initial
assumption. That is the statistical error you made.

What error? That the members here are not representative of the general
public? I hate to tell you this but in many ways they are representative
of the general public. Probably in most ways. In statistics they
certainly are representative of the public in many ways. But I'm saying
in one way they are not, that they are not as well educated as the norm.

To prove me wrong all you have to do is prove that more than 25% of the
people in RCM have college degrees. You don't know my assumption is
wrong. You have no proof that it's wrong. You think it is but you don't
have any proof. So you can't say truthfully that my assumption is wrong
unless you can prove it first. But you don't have any way to do that.

Not the way things work. You are the one contending that the people
that post in RCM are representative of the general public. -And using
that in an argument. So the burden of proof is up to you.

I didn't use a statistical proof in this case. I used reason and logic
and what I said is my theory. I didn't say I had concrete proof. Given
the facts I know I told you my theory. If you disagree with my
conclusion then it is up to you to explain, or prove, why I am wrong.

So did you ever take any courses in statistics? A quick look at CSU
Chico did not find any requirement to take either statistics or
econmics.

I did, but it was not in the regular course work for a bachelor's
degree. It was in graduate school.

Hawke