Where’s the BS? She’s making a case (a very clear case IMHO) that the current data gathering and subsequent statics being used are flawed.
She didn’t propose any master plan conspiracy theory. She is saying that the world is knowingly putting itself into the biggest Depression since the 1930s and is doing so using flawed data. And that that is worrying.
People in power like statistics partly because of the fact that they do not have detailed knowledge of the issue in hand. This is not a criticism, just being head of a large global corporation doesn’t mean you know every detail of every aspect of everything that goes on in that corporation. And exactly the same (but even more so) applies to heads of state. To make sense of complex matters quickly, they like to be presented with clear statistics.
This is normally ok, but a few assumption changes, or input rule decisions, or errors in the base input data, or skewed input data, can cause big differences in statistical outcome, EASILY big enough to influence decisions made at the top.
Statistical analysis gets very complex in order to factor in myriad of influences factors. It then defeats its purpose by no longer being simple. So people then apply various assumptions to the models to simplify them. Each time this is done, the opportunity to skew the data, intentionally or not, is huge.
Statistical analysis has means and methods to avoid such things, but it all takes time and adds complexity, two things that are under huge pressure in this current case. There will be many honest statisticians involved in the process who raise their hand, but in times of stress, these people often get drowned out.
Calling out errors in the bases level data gathering and inputting in a topic this big and this serious seems very valid to me.
A fantastic, if very simple, example of this happened at Chernobyl. Radiation readings of ‘X’ were found, and whilst X wasn’t good, it wasn’t a disaster. The X readings got past up the echelons of power, each time being taken as fact.
But in reality, the device only went up to X, it was simply maxing out at that figure. People raising their hand to point this out got drowned out!
I am NO covid denier etc. But I am seeing very unreasonable use of statistics currently. And as said earlier, considering the magnitude of the decisions being made on this data, I think this is worrying.
This is why I made the point about the much used ‘death count’ figure. Without something against which to compare this (ie total deaths) it really is meaningless. But it is being splashed all over headlines all over the world.
That is wrong folks.