CanPol Megathread: Big Changus

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Dr. Stab: Sep 12, 2010; 👨🏻‍⚕️🩺🔪🙀😱🙀

flakeloaf posted:

Vaccinations cause asparagus syndrome.

Someone should publish a paper studying the link between being on vacation and eating asparagus. There's probably one sort of correlation one way or the other.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 17:58

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# ? May 18, 2024 20:39

infernal machines: Oct 11, 2012; we monitor many frequencies. we listen always. came a voice, out of the babel of tongues, speaking to us. it played us a mighty dub.

Entropic posted:

I'm always amazed at what's apparently legal to advertise whenever I pass the naturopathic clinic.

It's a hangover cure and a great way to get hepatitis!

# ? Apr 27, 2016 18:06

Helsing: Aug 23, 2003; DON'T POST IN THE ELECTION THREAD UNLESS YOU JOE BIDEN

Oakland Martini posted:

More disposable income going towards debt service is bad. Canada's debt-to-income ratio is definitely worrying. That said, a terrible article published in a terrible journal* and written by that journal's editor** doesn't provide sufficient support for your assertion, particularly concerning the bolded part. Progressive taxation and redistributive transfers can go a long way towards mitigating rising income inequality. For example, this paper, which has not yet been peer reviewed but was written by economists at good institutions and has been well-cited, shows that redistribution completely mitigated the increase in pre-tax income inequality during the Great Recession --- inequality in disposable income and consumption did not rise at all.

I'm a bit confused about which "assertion" of mine you are critiquing. To be clear, the sentence that you bolded was not me presenting my own opinion, that was my summarizing what I understood to be PT6A's (implicit) position, which I was disagreeing with. I personally think that institutions and the distribution of income are very important. I can't tell whether we're disagreeing on this point so some clarification would be helpful.

That having been said, I do not believe that redistribution or progressive taxes alone are an adequate response to what is fundamentally a political problem. Wealth inequality has reached a point where it's part of a self reinforcing cycles. As inequality has increased the primary beneficiaries -- the wealthy, and the various corporations, partnerships, etc. which they rely on -- have been given more and more influence, and thus more ability to reshape the system and further entrench their position. The decline of other civil society actors that once would have provided countervailing influences has only exacerbated this problem.

I don't personally believe a technocratic solution would be sufficient. The problem can't just be reduced to skills biased technical change or increased global trade. More fundamentally it's about political power and influence, which shapes the direction and outcome of broader societal trends like globalization or the increasing financialization of the economy.

quote:

* The best journal in economics, the American Economic Review, has an impact factor of 2.7; the JEI has an impact factor of 0.07.
** Journal editors publishing their own sole-authored work in their own journals is an obvious sign of CV-padding and general journal shittiness.

I don't think that the number of citations a paper receives is a particularly worthwhile metric for evaluating quality given that economics has largely been colonized by a single methodology and a small handful of schools. There is plenty of worthwhile work going on in the economics field but the field itself is not terrible respectable at this point. Economists tend to ignore other disciplines, they're highly insular and mostly cite people from a small handful of institutions, their relationships with the business world is far too cozy - to the point of being a conflict of interests, in spirit if not by the letter of the law - and they tend to be very hostile to any perspective which doesn't rely heavily on mathematical formulations. I wouldn't expect a paper like the one I just cited to be well received by the economics profession because it is essentially criticizing the direction the discipline has been taking.

There are lots of great economists out there making really interesting observations about the world or reporting on important empirical phenomena, but I try to judge that on a case by case basis. The discipline as a whole has been a victim of its own social prestige.

quote:

Economists Still Think Economics Is the Best

Despite failing to foresee the largest financial crisis since the Great Depression, leaders in the field still fail to look for wisdom beyond its bounds.

Ten years ago, a survey published in the Journal of Economic Perspectives found that 77 percent of the doctoral candidates in the leading American economics programs agreed or strongly agreed with the statement "economics is the most scientific of the social sciences."

In the intervening decade, a massive economic crisis rocked the global economy, and most economists never saw it coming. Nevertheless, little has changed: A new paper from the same publication reveals how economists continue to believe that their science is superior to all other social sciences, such as political science, sociology, anthropology, etc. While there may be budding intentions to appeal to other disciplines in order to enrich their theories (especially psychology and neuroscience), the reality is that economists almost exclusively study�and cite�each other.

The authors of the article, Marion Fourcade, Etienne Ollion, and Yann Algan, looked at the 25 most respected publications in each of three disciplines: economics, politics, and sociology. They found that between 2000 and 2009, The American Economic Review (AER), the most prestigious economics journal, published articles in which 40 percent of the citations referred to the other 24 major economic publications. In contrast, just 0.8 percent of citations referred to political-science peer-reviewed journals and a meager 0.3 percent to sociology publications. (The majority of the citations went to books or publications not among the 25 the researchers included.) This is to say that in all the texts published in the top 50 journals in the other two social sciences in over ten years, economists found only about 1 percent of articles worth mentioning.

And there�s more. When asked their response to the statement: "In general, interdisciplinary knowledge is better than the knowledge obtained by a single discipline," the majority (57 percent) of American economics professors disagreed. By contrast, most of their colleagues in sociology (75 percent) and political science (72 percent) agreed that an interdisciplinary approach is preferable.

But economists don�t disdain all other disciplines; the fields of finance and business appear to have plenty of appeal. While economists reference other social sciences less and less, citations to articles published in academic journals about finance have skyrocketed. And when examining where the majority of authors published in AER were employed, Fourcade, Ollion, and Algan found that in the 1950s only 3.2 percent of the authors worked as business school professors. But in the decade following the year 2000, that percentage rose to 18 percent.

Luigi Zingales, a respected economist and finance professor at the University of Chicago�s Booth School of Business quoted in the AER paper, worries that the proximity of his economist colleagues to the business and finance worlds will threaten their independence and shape their agenda, conclusions, and recommendations. Zingales found, for example, that when academic authors are not employed in business schools, their writing is significantly less likely to justify high executive compensation, and in fact will more often find fault with it. Of those surveyed, two-thirds of sociologists and one-third of economists believe that private company executives receive excessive pay. Few finance professors agree.

When an outright majority of economists being polled reject the idea that interdisciplinary knowledge is better than a narrow focus on their own research that strikes me as a huge warning sign.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 18:08

Azerban: Oct 28, 2003

Jordan7hm posted:

No, it really wouldn't. The child services system is not a good place to grow up in, and for as dumb as these people are, their kids are at least growing up in a home where people love them.

If you can say anything in this case, it's that the parents love their kids to death.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 18:10

Furnaceface: Oct 21, 2004

Entropic posted:

I'm always amazed at what's apparently legal to advertise whenever I pass the naturopathic clinic.

This country needs to take a serious stance on alt med practices and natural/herbal products. Shits starting to get dangerous.

I work at a pharmacy that is across the street from a chiropractic/naturopathic clinic and that place is an endless source of frustration and misinformation. You dont tell people on Altace to use alternative salts like potassium. Unless of course the goal is hyperkalemia.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 18:25

infernal machines: Oct 11, 2012; we monitor many frequencies. we listen always. came a voice, out of the babel of tongues, speaking to us. it played us a mighty dub.

Furnaceface posted:

This country needs to take a serious stance on alt med practices and natural/herbal products. Shits starting to get dangerous.

Yeah, like for instance the hundreds of "medicinal" pot shops that opened up overnight here in Toronto.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 18:27

McGavin: Sep 18, 2012

Furnaceface posted:

You dont tell people on Altace to use alternative salts like potassium. Unless of course the goal is hyperkalemia.

That's just what Big Medicine wants you to think! :bahgawd:

# ? Apr 27, 2016 18:30

flakeloaf: Feb 26, 2003; Still better than android clock

infernal machines posted:

Yeah, like for instance the hundreds of "medicinal" pot shops that opened up overnight here in Toronto.

That conversation's going to get a lot louder when someone with untreated mental illness gets a shady MMPR and unlocks the part of his inner monologue that can convince him to swan-dive off the Bayview bridge.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 18:30

infernal machines: Oct 11, 2012; we monitor many frequencies. we listen always. came a voice, out of the babel of tongues, speaking to us. it played us a mighty dub.

flakeloaf posted:

That conversation's going to get a lot louder when someone with untreated mental illness gets a shady MMPR and unlocks the part of his inner monologue that can convince him to swan-dive off the Bayview bridge.

Frankly I'm amazed that hasn't happened already. Considering the barrier to a "prescription" is a 5 minute consultation with a naturopath over Skype, I'm surprised we don't have more newbies overdosing on edibles and showing up in the ER freaking out.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 18:38

Helsing: Aug 23, 2003; DON'T POST IN THE ELECTION THREAD UNLESS YOU JOE BIDEN

McGavin posted:

That's just what Big Medicine wants you to think!

The proper term is "the medical mafia". :eng99:

I have a family member who is friends with someone who is deep into this lunacy and these people are actively harmful. This woman has actively discouraged my relative from getting cancer screenings because negative feelings are the real cause of cancer and thus the stress of getting a screening will give you cancer, which is proven by the fact that people only get their cancer diagnosis after they've been screened. I remember my relative (who is an absolutely lovely person but maybe not always the strongest in terms of critical thinking) was in tears before she had to go to this routine check up because while she wasn't actually listening to her friend's advice she was still clearly freaked out by it.

Another time this same woman lectured me on the dangers of Sun Screen. She saw me applying some and told me that actually my skin would benefit from all those healthy rays of sunlight but would would damaged by the "chemicals" in the sunscreen. Other than the fact that this completely ignored the danger of getting a painful sun burn, this advice drove me nuts because of the sheer inconsistency. Having previously claimed that cancer is caused by negative feelings, she now acknowledged that it could apparently also be caused by "chemicals", but of course only the bad chemicals in sunscreen and not the good healthy radiation contained in sunlight.

It was really sad and frustrating watching this woman (who apparently had self published some books on this poo poo) actively spread medically dangerous ideas.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 18:39

Risky Bisquick: Jan 18, 2008; PLEASE LET ME WRITE YOUR VICTIM IMPACT STATEMENT SO I CAN FURTHER DEMONSTRATE THE CALAMITY THAT IS OUR JUSTICE SYSTEM.; Buglord

Jordan7hm posted:

No, it really wouldn't. The child services system is not a good place to grow up in, and for as dumb as these people are, their kids are at least growing up in a home where people love them. The best thing would be for one of the parents to realize that they should bring their kid to a real doctor next time something happens.

You would be taking the position that these people will learn from their 'misjudgment' and not repeat the same action with another illness. So you are balancing perhaps the mental health well being of their children over their physical health. Given how their defense team has framed the case I suspect that they would act similarly in the future with sick children whose symptoms don't improve over time. I really don't see how they can rehabilitate their lifestyle choice given they own that company and promote its similar alt-med philosophy.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 18:41

Furnaceface: Oct 21, 2004

Helsing posted:

The proper term is "the medical mafia".

I have a family member who is friends with someone who is deep into this lunacy and these people are actively harmful. This woman has actively discouraged my relative from getting cancer screenings because negative feelings are the real cause of cancer and thus the stress of getting a screening will give you cancer, which is proven by the fact that people only get their cancer diagnosis after they've been screened. I remember my relative (who is an absolutely lovely person but maybe not always the strongest in terms of critical thinking) was in tears before she had to go to this routine check up because while she wasn't actually listening to her friend's advice she was still clearly freaked out by it.

Another time this same woman lectured me on the dangers of Sun Screen. She saw me applying some and told me that actually my skin would benefit from all those healthy rays of sunlight but would would damaged by the "chemicals" in the sunscreen. Other than the fact that this completely ignored the danger of getting a painful sun burn, this advice drove me nuts because of the sheer inconsistency. Having previously claimed that cancer is caused by negative feelings, she now acknowledged that it could apparently also be caused by "chemicals", but of course only the bad chemicals in sunscreen and not the good healthy radiation contained in sunlight.

It was really sad and frustrating watching this woman (who apparently had self published some books on this poo poo) actively spread medically dangerous ideas.

Sometimes I want to argue with these kinds of people until Im blue in the face, but it doesnt help anyone and just creates more problems.

The best hope we have is just getting more information and making the access to it better and easier through government legislation. Give Health Canada some actual teeth to combat snake oil peddlers, force these companies (which, ironically, are usually subsidiaries of all the big pharma people constantly rag on :v:

) to put out more information on their labels, prevent them from just putting random poo poo on the shelves without any kind of scientific testing, and for the love of all that is holy ban Dr Oz from being shown/read/talked about up here.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 18:53

PT6A: Jan 5, 2006; Public school teachers are callous dictators who won't lift a finger to stop children from peeing in my plane

jm20 posted:

You would be taking the position that these people will learn from their 'misjudgment' and not repeat the same action with another illness. So you are balancing perhaps the mental health well being of their children over their physical health. Given how their defense team has framed the case I suspect that they would act similarly in the future with sick children whose symptoms don't improve over time. I really don't see how they can rehabilitate their lifestyle choice given they own that company and promote its similar alt-med philosophy.

Yeah, it's clear that if they're sorry for anything, it's for getting caught, not for committing a heinous crime by letting their child die of a preventable and curable disease. They obviously need prison because it's clear that they, and those who follow the same brand of lunacy, have not learned their lesson. Rehabilitation is clearly needed.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 18:56

Helsing: Aug 23, 2003; DON'T POST IN THE ELECTION THREAD UNLESS YOU JOE BIDEN

Edit: On second thought, this thread already has too much posting about posting.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 19:10

Hexigrammus: May 22, 2006; Cheech Wizard stories are clean, wholesome, reflective truths that go great with the marijuana munchies and a blow job.

EvilJoven posted:

At least from what I've seen. Tons of fad diets and green smoothies, the word 'toxins' being thrown about along with poo poo like 'I'm going on a cleanse' which is code for eating nothing but papya or some poo poo for a week then spending the weekend sitting on the toilet. Spending thousands on health seminars where they tell you that you can get a proper diagnosis for any ailment via iridology and yes some vocal anti vaxxers.

I''m old, so other than funerals it's been a long time since I've been near an SDA church. That sounds like a logical extension of where they were at when I left. A True Seventh Day Adventist only eats two vegetarian meals a day and the purity of what goes into the temple of your body is very, very important. None of that devil-drug caffeine for YOU, it makes the baby Jesus cry.

Sort of like the menstruation Wahhabists who spend their time obsessing about when exactly women are unclean. Admittedly this is probably better than the Jihad Wahhabists who obsess about how best to take over the world, put their women in bags, tax the hell out of Christians and Jews, and enslave the rest. Nice to have goals in life, I guess.

God, I hope we never see a resurgence of other aspects of the health movement of the late 1800s - early 1900s, especially the one that had people monitoring their health daily by closely examining their bowel movements. There were toilets during that period designed with a shelf molded into the porcelain to catch the faeces and hold them above the water seal for poking and prodding. I stayed in an old house in Amsterdam once that had one in the water closet. It was as disgusting an environment as any outhouse I've been in. Looks like a great vector for Norovirus and hopefully that design would never make it past Health Canada. Although looking at what has already slipped past them I'm not so sure.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 19:21

EvilJoven: Mar 18, 2005; NOBODY,IN THE HISTORY OF EVER, HAS ASKED OR CARED WHAT CANADA THINKS. YOU ARE NOT A COUNTRY. YOUR MONEY HAS THE QUEEN OF ENGLAND ON IT. IF YOU DIG AROUND IN YOUR BACKYARD, NATIVE SKELETONS WOULD EXPLODE OUT OF YOUR LAWN LIKE THE END OF POLTERGEIST. CANADA IS SO POLITE, EH?; Fun Shoe

Ya that period had a lot of hilarious bullshit. I love telling people that Cornflakes were meant as part of a treatment regimen that included torture and genital mutilation to keep mental patients from having sex and masturbating.

With almost everyone having a smart phone it's pretty much always met with a "that's bullshit" *pulls out phone* "holy poo poo" reaction.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 19:55

The Butcher: Apr 20, 2005; Well, at least we tried.; Nap Ghost

infernal machines posted:

Frankly I'm amazed that hasn't happened already. Considering the barrier to a "prescription" is a 5 minute consultation with a naturopath over Skype, I'm surprised we don't have more newbies overdosing on edibles and showing up in the ER freaking out.

Pretty sure I've seen some studies based on the Netherlands that showed moving to a legal distribution model didn't do much to actually increase the % of people that consume it.

From what I hear most people saying, it's "sure will be nice to buy weed legally from a store instead of a sketchcase dealer" and not "I can't wait for it to be legal so I can try for the first time."

Anyone who wants to use it probably already does.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 20:46

infernal machines: Oct 11, 2012; we monitor many frequencies. we listen always. came a voice, out of the babel of tongues, speaking to us. it played us a mighty dub.

The Butcher posted:

Anyone who wants to use it probably already does.

That's a fair assumption. I'd be more concerned about there being no regulation on things like strength and dosages in edible products being sold as "medicine". Not that it's any worse than what you can do to yourself by misusing any other kind of natural supplement.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 20:56

Juul-Whip: Mar 10, 2008

What was that about progressives opposing Leap "because jobs"? :allears:

John Horgan sure is a great leader for the NDP, siding with the Right - against his own base - on pipelines.

Juul-Whip fucked around with this message at 21:21 on Apr 27, 2016

# ? Apr 27, 2016 21:05

Lassitude: Oct 21, 2003

jm20 posted:

I actually thought our EMT's in Ontario didn't do intubation, I know our RPN's are a basically useless cost savings crutch for our healthcare system. It's only the RN's that do them, and you want people with practical experience doing them regularly to not unlike placing an IV in a less common area when necessary.

It depends on the base hospital physician what medics can do, but in Ontario, ACPs are trained to intubate, put in chest tubes, and so on.

Oh, and RPNs can do most things RNs can do. I wouldn't call them useless, just statistically less competent. But boy they sure are a lot cheaper to employ.

Lassitude fucked around with this message at 21:15 on Apr 27, 2016

# ? Apr 27, 2016 21:09

Ron_Jeremy: Sep 29, 2003

Helsing posted:

"Despite failing to foresee the largest financial crisis since the Great Depression, leaders in the field still fail to look for wisdom beyond its bounds."

This is totally tangental to your point, but god drat, this sort of poo poo pisses me off. Can anyone please name me another discipline where "ability to accurately predict the future" is held up as the standard by which the discipline is evaluated?

# ? Apr 27, 2016 21:41

Juul-Whip: Mar 10, 2008

Climatology

# ? Apr 27, 2016 21:42

flakeloaf: Feb 26, 2003; Still better than android clock

The subprime lending crash was predicted just fine by all the rich pricks who bet on it happening

# ? Apr 27, 2016 21:55

Postess with the Mostest: Apr 4, 2007; Arabian nights
'neath Arabian moons
A fool off his guard
could fall and fall hard
out there on the dunes

Pollsters

# ? Apr 27, 2016 21:55

Square Peg: Nov 11, 2008

Ron_Jeremy posted:

This is totally tangental to your point, but god drat, this sort of poo poo pisses me off. Can anyone please name me another discipline where "ability to accurately predict the future" is held up as the standard by which the discipline is evaluated?

Every other thing that calls itself a science is based around finding the outcome of a set of premises, so I guess all of them?

# ? Apr 27, 2016 21:57

Lain Iwakura: Aug 5, 2004; The body exists only to verify one's own existence.; Taco Defender

Cultural Imperial posted:

John Horgan is loving worthless. Why isn't he tearing Christy Clark a new rear end in a top hat right now?

Because CI cannot be bothered to post a link:

http://www.cknw.com/2016/04/27/political-donations-appear-to-be-used-to-top-up-premiers-salary/
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/british-columbia/christy-clarks-salary-being-topped-up-by-donations-to-bc-liberal-party/article29767196/

quote:

Christy Clark�s salary being topped up by donations to BC Liberal Party
GARY MASON
VANCOUVER � The Globe and Mail
Published Wednesday, Apr. 27, 2016 6:00AM EDT
Last updated Wednesday, Apr. 27, 2016 10:54AM EDT

Premier Christy Clark is paid tens of thousands of dollars each year by the BC Liberal Party � an income that is drawn from coffers infused by donor contributions and is in addition to the nearly $200,000 she earns annually as the head of government.

The Globe and Mail has learned that Ms. Clark is given between $30,000 and $50,000 a year from the BC Liberal Party for work she does for it throughout the year, including attending fundraising events. A spokesman with the Liberals of Ontario said that Premier Kathleen Wynne does not get a salary from the party. The BC NDP Party does not pay its leader anything, either. A spokesman for NDP Leader John Horgan said he has been reimbursed for a �couple of suits� during his time in the job.

The revelation about Ms. Clark�s extra payments follows Globe reports that she has been appearing at intimate donor get-togethers at which well-heeled patrons pay large amounts of cash for a chance to get rare, private face time with the most powerful politician in the province.

NDP MLA David Eby says the fact the money the Liberals are paying the Premier comes from party fundraising events that she headlines and at which attendees can pay $20,000 or more to gain privileged access amounts to a direct benefit.

Mr. Eby has made a complaint with the province�s conflict-of-interest commissioner over the cash-for-access events, charging that the Premier is clearly benefiting from her role at these sel-ect, secret dinners. Recently, a lawyer representing Ms. Clark filed a response to Mr. Eby�s objection, suggesting that any donations made at the events at which the Premier has been in attendance do not pass the test of what constitutes a private interest under the conflict act.

Conflict commissioner Paul Fraser has yet to rule on the matter.

The Globe has also learned that Ms. Clark�s lawyer is being paid with funds from the Liberal caucus � in other words, taxpayer dollars. It is the same taxpayer-funded revenue source that Ms. Clark�s office raided in 2013 to help underwrite the ethnic outreach strategy that became a provincewide scandal.

Mr. Eby says it is unconscionable that the Premier is getting taxpayers to pay for her lawyers regarding a complaint that stems from her role at Liberal party fundraising events.

�It�s a very serious issue that public funds are being used to defend the Liberals� fundraising methods in a bid to allow them to continue to raise funds in the way they see fit,� Mr. Eby told The Globe. �That is definitely not what the money is intended for.�

Under B.C. conflict-of-interest laws, the key requirements for a conflict to occur are that an official act or duty is being done and that it�s being performed by somebody who is being given a direct benefit through the execution of those duties. Mr. Eby believes that there is no question his complaint meets those conditions.

�The Premier�s lawyer is saying that my complaint does not speak to any duties or powers that she has or might exercise at these fundraising events,� Mr. Eby said. �And they say that even if we did show that, there is no direct benefit, so there�s no conflict or perceived conflict.

�I�m saying the powers she has are so obvious I didn�t think I needed to detail them. She is the chair of cabinet. She sets the entire agenda. She decides when the discussion in cabinet is over so that means she can pull things off the agenda that would hurt her donors or put things on the agenda that would help her donors.�

Besides the salary she gets paid by the Liberals, the other direct benefit the Premier receives from the high-yield fundraising events, according to Mr. Eby, is money that her Kelowna-Westside constituency association receives from party funds accumulated through the same donor events. Mr. Eby says that previous rulings by conflict commissioners in British Columbia have determined that a benefit to a members� constituency amounts to a direct benefit under the act.

Ms. Clark has come under fire for her cash-for-access events, ones that helped the party raise a record $10-million in 2015. The party said it intends on holding many more over the next 14 months in the lead up to the 2017 election.

The same type of functions caused a political storm in Ontario recently too. As a result, Ms. Wynne immediately banned them and announced that the province will move to prohibit all corporate and union donations in the future.

Ms. Clark, meantime, has said she will continue to hold private fundraisers and will not ban corporate and union donations. British Columbia has arguably the most lax campaign finance laws in the country. The Liberals refuse to disclose the identity of those attending the private meetings with the Premier or how much they are paying for that access. The Globe determined independently what the price tag was for some fundraising dinners with the Premier.

The Liberal party has said it is considering reporting on donations more often than once a year.

Basically Christy is getting a $50,000 top-up from the political party she leads in addition to her salary.

Eby, who is not leader of the NDP, is doing a better job at making GBS threads on Clark over this than Horgan is.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 22:10

Juul-Whip: Mar 10, 2008

Someone needs to mount a palace coup against Horgan before he delivers half our supporters to the loving Green Party.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 22:17

Ron_Jeremy: Sep 29, 2003

THC posted:

Climatology

That's not bad, I'll give you that one.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 22:44

Ron_Jeremy: Sep 29, 2003

flakeloaf posted:

The subprime lending crash was predicted just fine by all the rich pricks who bet on it happening

What about all of the rich pricks who lost money betting the other way? Betting for the dealer to bust when he's showing a 6 is pretty much what those guys were doing. At the end of the day, it might be an informed bet, but it's still a bet.

Ron_Jeremy fucked around with this message at 22:54 on Apr 27, 2016

# ? Apr 27, 2016 22:46

Ron_Jeremy: Sep 29, 2003

Square Peg posted:

Every other thing that calls itself a science is based around finding the outcome of a set of premises, so I guess all of them?

Finding is the key word there. Predict an outcome, test your hypothesis, revise the hypothesis based on the results. Not, predict an outcome, test your hypothesis, if it's wrong, your science is worthless.

It's 2016, and people still want the goddamn Oracle of Delphi.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 22:53

PT6A: Jan 5, 2006; Public school teachers are callous dictators who won't lift a finger to stop children from peeing in my plane

The degree to which people expect you to be correct depends greatly on how certain you act in presenting your hypothesis.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 22:56

P-Value Hack: Apr 4, 2016

Ron_Jeremy posted:

Finding is the key word there. Predict an outcome, test your hypothesis, revise the hypothesis based on the results. Not, predict an outcome, test your hypothesis, if it's wrong, your science is worthless.

It's 2016, and people still want the goddamn Oracle of Delphi.

Eh it's a lot more complicated than that. I know we got a data science guy here who could prob answer it better, but the real criticism of some economics isn't their research methodology, it's the lovely unchallenged assumptions and rational choice models they use in their research that get eaten up as fact. No one's asking them to change their methodology, people are asking to challenge their stupid philosophies that guide the input they use for their models. Like obsessions over rational choice theory and invisible-hand of the free market poo poo.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 22:58

Albino Squirrel: Apr 25, 2003; Miosis more like meiosis

Holy poo poo Christy Clark is corrupt like a Southern governor from the Thirties.

Entropic posted:

I'm always amazed at what's apparently legal to advertise whenever I pass the naturopathic clinic.

Everything I've seen about naturopathy has its main 'advantage' that a provider gets to spend more time with the patient, talk about their health issues, reassure them etc.

I'm not sure how that squares with a 'free 10 min consult' to talk about CANCER TREATMENT.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 23:00

Ron_Jeremy: Sep 29, 2003

P-Value Hack posted:

Eh it's a lot more complicated than that. I know we got a data science guy here who could prob answer it better, but the real criticism of some economics isn't their research methodology, it's the lovely unchallenged assumptions and rational choice models they use in their research that get eaten up as fact. No one's asking them to change their methodology, people are asking to challenge their stupid philosophies that guide the input they use for their models. Like obsessions over rational choice theory and invisible-hand of the free market poo poo.

That's perfectly rational criticism, on which there can be reasonable debate. I just am commenting on the refrain of "Durr, how come you can't tell me what interest rates will be next year, econ sux" that underlay that article that was posted.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 23:03

Ron_Jeremy: Sep 29, 2003

PT6A posted:

The degree to which people expect you to be correct depends greatly on how certain you act in presenting your hypothesis.

I'll agree with that too. Articles stating "Chief Economist of Greater Slobovia Credit Union predicts housing price collapse" are just as dumb.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 23:08

P-Value Hack: Apr 4, 2016

Ron_Jeremy posted:

That's perfectly rational criticism, on which there can be reasonable debate. I just am commenting on the refrain of "Durr, how come you can't tell me what interest rates will be next year, econ sux" that underlay that article that was posted.

You do realize that basic neoclassical economics is pretty much the standard model of economics taught in most university programs ?

# ? Apr 27, 2016 23:09

RBC: Nov 23, 2007; IM STILL SPENDING MONEY FROM 1888

Ron_Jeremy posted:

That's perfectly rational criticism, on which there can be reasonable debate. I just am commenting on the refrain of "Durr, how come you can't tell me what interest rates will be next year, econ sux" that underlay that article that was posted.

I don't think you read the article at all.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 23:28

Ron_Jeremy: Sep 29, 2003

RBC posted:

I don't think you read the article at all.

Sigh. I stated up front that what I was talking about was completely tangental.

# ? Apr 27, 2016 23:55

angerbot: Mar 23, 2004; plob

flakeloaf posted:

Because when I think about places to go when I wanna win my cancer battle, I think of Thunder Bay.

"Well, I may have cancer, but I don't have to live in Thunder Bay"

# ? Apr 27, 2016 23:58

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ? May 18, 2024 20:39

the talent deficit: Dec 20, 2003; self-deprecation is a very british trait, and problems can arise when the british attempt to do so with a foreign culture

Albino Squirrel posted:

Holy poo poo Christy Clark is corrupt like a Southern governor from the Thirties.

Nah, she's probably a lot worse.

Site C Hydroelectric Project (a project no one wants) is going to get built on the back of Alberta promising to buy it's output. Northern Gateway (a project no one wants) is going to get built because without it Alberta won't buy Site C's output. Two megaprojects contrary to the public interest that Christie can then point at to prove she's a job creator or whatever

the talent deficit fucked around with this message at 00:04 on Apr 28, 2016

# ? Apr 27, 2016 23:59

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > CanPol Megathread: Big Changus

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