Does reading a lot of Wikipedia give people a wrong idea how science works?
August 27, 2023 at 9:21 am
When I was discussing my paper about applying information theory to the Croatian river names on Internet forums, many people told me stuff like "Fuck off with those p-values, go to Alternativa." (Alternativa being a subforum of forum.hr dedicated to things like astrology). That is obviously an absurd thing to say, as p-values are a foundation of the modern scientific method. But why do people on Internet forums say things like that?
I think that is because they have read a lot of tertiary sources (Wikipedia, etymological dictionaries...) and little or no primary and secondary sources. Wikipedia and other tertiary sources of information almost never discuss p-values. So no wonder discussions about p-values sound alien to them. It is very unfortunate.
I was wondering what you thought about that.
I think that is because they have read a lot of tertiary sources (Wikipedia, etymological dictionaries...) and little or no primary and secondary sources. Wikipedia and other tertiary sources of information almost never discuss p-values. So no wonder discussions about p-values sound alien to them. It is very unfortunate.
I was wondering what you thought about that.
