Sure, we do things impulsively, but all of us also make rational decisions based on some evidence—past experience or study. So, when we see a TV advertisement for a new medicine that offers some hope to the afflicted but that also comes with warnings of side effects, we have choices: Jump in with both feet, test a little, or refrain from use. This last choice would mostly likely result from our hearing that one of the side effects is death.
I especially like the advertisement for a medicine that advises, “If you are allergic to this product, don’t take it” (not in those exact words). I wonder. How will I know if I’m allergic unless I take it? And considering that advertisement makes me think about impulsive and rational decisions.
Recently, two scientific journals have questioned the use of the term statistical significance. The term is part of our common language even if we never took a statistic course. We assume that something that is statistically significant has a value that can serve as a predicate for action. For the most part, we’re okay with that. We think, “Chances are I’m not going to be the one to…get salmonella from bagged salad…be in the airplane that crashes…catch the bubonic plague…get bitten by a West Nile Virus mosquito… or any of a myriad of other possible negatives.” For scientists, the statistical significance lies in the range of a 5% probability. With regard to those advertised cures, less than five percent keeps you from the side effects—we think.
But all of us are individuals, and all of us live very complex lives in very complex bodies under very complex circumstances. Is five percent a good guide, a good limitation, on whether or not something is significant or insignificant statistically? Wouldn’t we all be happier when we know that the bad things are even less likely to occur, say on the order of just part of one percent?
Those complex lives we live give us little time to consider rationally all that we do. Often, we just take our chances, even when they might include a greater than five percent probability of some personally detrimental consequence. We hear some say, “When your time’s up, it’s up.” But that is a que sera, sera attitude that suggests a helplessness, and ignores that we don’t have to stand under a tree on a golf course during a lightning storm. Que sera, sera is the justification of those easing themselves into one addiction or another. The chances, for example, of one’s getting “vomiting syndrome” or becoming psychotic with continued use of cannabis is “within the acceptable risk.” We hear, “Statistically, that’s probably not going to happen to me.”
Because we live on a planet of risks, we could become obsessed with the statistical favorability of any of our actions, but we’re human, so we don’t act on reason alone. We know that about 50% of marriages fail, but people still marry. You will eat certain foods, take a supplement, swallow a prescription pill, chance an operation, or make a purchase on some basis you believe to be relatively certain. Thus, in most matters we teeter on a fence between doing and not doing, often jumping to one side merely on impulse because we can’t know with absolute certainty. A complex life has us walk many fences simultaneously and serially.
You will make many decisions today all based on your sense of their probable outcomes. Some, as experience has shown you, will be so-so; some will be great; maybe one or two will be regrettable. On what basis will you decide?
I especially like the advertisement for a medicine that advises, “If you are allergic to this product, don’t take it” (not in those exact words). I wonder. How will I know if I’m allergic unless I take it? And considering that advertisement makes me think about impulsive and rational decisions.
Recently, two scientific journals have questioned the use of the term statistical significance. The term is part of our common language even if we never took a statistic course. We assume that something that is statistically significant has a value that can serve as a predicate for action. For the most part, we’re okay with that. We think, “Chances are I’m not going to be the one to…get salmonella from bagged salad…be in the airplane that crashes…catch the bubonic plague…get bitten by a West Nile Virus mosquito… or any of a myriad of other possible negatives.” For scientists, the statistical significance lies in the range of a 5% probability. With regard to those advertised cures, less than five percent keeps you from the side effects—we think.
But all of us are individuals, and all of us live very complex lives in very complex bodies under very complex circumstances. Is five percent a good guide, a good limitation, on whether or not something is significant or insignificant statistically? Wouldn’t we all be happier when we know that the bad things are even less likely to occur, say on the order of just part of one percent?
Those complex lives we live give us little time to consider rationally all that we do. Often, we just take our chances, even when they might include a greater than five percent probability of some personally detrimental consequence. We hear some say, “When your time’s up, it’s up.” But that is a que sera, sera attitude that suggests a helplessness, and ignores that we don’t have to stand under a tree on a golf course during a lightning storm. Que sera, sera is the justification of those easing themselves into one addiction or another. The chances, for example, of one’s getting “vomiting syndrome” or becoming psychotic with continued use of cannabis is “within the acceptable risk.” We hear, “Statistically, that’s probably not going to happen to me.”
Because we live on a planet of risks, we could become obsessed with the statistical favorability of any of our actions, but we’re human, so we don’t act on reason alone. We know that about 50% of marriages fail, but people still marry. You will eat certain foods, take a supplement, swallow a prescription pill, chance an operation, or make a purchase on some basis you believe to be relatively certain. Thus, in most matters we teeter on a fence between doing and not doing, often jumping to one side merely on impulse because we can’t know with absolute certainty. A complex life has us walk many fences simultaneously and serially.
You will make many decisions today all based on your sense of their probable outcomes. Some, as experience has shown you, will be so-so; some will be great; maybe one or two will be regrettable. On what basis will you decide?
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