Things you like that most other people don't like that you're not proud of

[KrazyHorse]

One post two post red post blue post

[Kuciwalker]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Census

A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring and recording information about the members of a given population. It is a regularly occurring and official count of a particular population. The term is used mostly in connection with national 'population and door to door censuses' (to be taken every 10 years according to United Nations recommendations), agriculture, and business censuses. The term itself comes from Latin: during the Roman Republic the census was a list which kept track of all adult males fit for military service.

The census can be contrasted with sampling in which information is obtained only from a subset of a population...

[KrazyHorse]

Yes, because all methods of statistical inference were banned by SCOTUS.

Then why are they allowed to use statistical imputation of the number of residents in houses they are unable to sample?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Census

You can keep quoting wikipedia, dude. I read that section before I even responded to Che the first time. The fact that the person who wrote that article is so retarded as to miss the fact that a census is a type of sampling has no bearing on the actual situation.

[KrazyHorse]

Seriously, this is hilarious. One would think that a mathy undergrad would have taught you what a subset is....

[ricketyclik]

I have no idea what you think it proves to quote what I said, bolding a single word.

I suggest you look up the definitions of "subset" and "proper subset"

Curses, foiled again!

I'll get you next time Marie, next time

[Kuciwalker]

Seriously, this is hilarious. One would think that a mathy undergrad would have taught you what a subset is....

Dude, it's obviously reasonable to set aside the trivial case as distinct.

[Kuciwalker]

Yes, because all methods of statistical inference were banned by SCOTUS.

Then why are they allowed to use statistical imputation of the number of residents in houses they are unable to sample?

Are they, for electoral purposes?

[KrazyHorse]

Dude, it's obviously reasonable to set aside the trivial case as distinct.

Good thing that not a single US census has actually managed to sample everybody then. They've all been proper subsets so far.

[KrazyHorse]

Are they, for electoral purposes?

Yes. Utah disputed this, but was shot down.

[KrazyHorse]

I'm not surprised SCOTUS has demonstrated such fundamental ignorance of the issue when even relatively intelligent Americans don't know what's meant by "sampling"

[Kuciwalker]

Good thing that not a single US census has actually managed to sample everybody then. They've all been proper subsets so far.

You are so caught up in your clever* insight that "taking a count and doing nothing to it" is a subset of "taking a count and possibly doing something to it" that you can't accept the blatantly obvious: in context, the ideas "taking a count, and then assuming that that count represents the entire population" and "taking a count, then using statistical inference to get a better estimate of the entire population" are distinct ideas, and that the first is called a census and the second is called sampling.

You know I'm right, you've been aware of this point for probably (hopefully?) the entire time, but have been trying to deflect it with wordplay and fallacies of equivocation.

*if you were talking to high school students, maybe

[Kuciwalker]

Yes. Utah disputed this, but was shot down.

My reading was that Utah disputed something entirely different (wrt non-counting of missionaries).

[KrazyHorse]

You are so caught up in your clever* insight that "taking a count and doing nothing to it" is a subset of "taking a count and possibly doing something to it" that you can't accept the blatantly obvious: in context, the ideas "taking a count, and then assuming that that count represents the entire population" and "taking a count, then using statistical inference to get a better estimate of the entire population" are distinct ideas, and that the first is called a census and the second is called sampling.

*if you were talking to high school students, maybe

No, that second is NOT CALLED SAMPLING.

Sampling is the ACT OF TAKING MEASUREMENTS FROM THE POPULATION. What you do with your sample is up to you as a statistician. Stepping up from a sampling to a population estimate is an "imputation" or "inference" or a "wild ass guess".

[KrazyHorse]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sampling_%28statistics%29

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statistical_inference

[Kuciwalker]

No, that second is NOT CALLED SAMPLING.

Sampling is the ACT OF TAKING MEASUREMENTS FROM THE POPULATION.

Except that in context, sampling has a different meaning, possibly (probably?) because of the 2000 controversy.