Statistical autopsy

by John on May 13, 2010

From R. A. Fisher, 1938:

To consult the statistician after an experiment is finished is often merely to ask him to conduct a post mortem examination. He can perhaps say what the experiment died of.

{ 1 trackback }

Tweets that mention Statistical autopsy — The Endeavour -- Topsy.com
05.13.10 at 23:10

{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }

1

Ben 05.14.10 at 04:42

An excellent observation. I’ve had too many people ask me for statistics help after the fact, and I’m not even an expert.

2

Alex 05.14.10 at 21:34

This is so true. The worst is when a grad student comes to you and you realize that some experiments they designed for their thesis research were massively underpowered and/or poorly designed. It’s just so disheartening.

Leave a Comment

You can use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>