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Go on then (sh.itjust.works)

submitted 2 days ago by StarvingMartist@sh.itjust.works to c/simpsonsshitposting@sh.itjust.works

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[–] BussyGyatt@feddit.org 13 points 1 day ago (2 children)

so, more than 2.7% in that category. almost like that claimed 2.7% is an intentionally misleading choice of "measure" of central tendency.

[–] sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works 3 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

Sure, and less than 2.7% in other categories. That's how averages work...

[–] BussyGyatt@feddit.org 3 points 19 hours ago* (last edited 18 hours ago) (1 children)

if i alert someone of the possibility of earning either 0 or 100 dollars at a coinflip by saying "the average payout is 50 dollars," while ive said something true, ive also said something misleading. a reasonable person might say, "0, but you said i could earn 50!" and would you expect them to be mollified by me saying, "no no no, its actually only the average is 50. i was clear about this up front." its like a student turning in their math homework and they didnt simplify the expression at the end, complaining about the teacher insisting you have to do all the work to earn full credit.

[–] sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works 2 points 11 hours ago (1 children)

Are you implying the average person doesn't understand averages? That's ridiculous! I could understand the average person not understanding standard deviations and other statistical terms, but a simple average is something people deal with every day.

All the inflation figure means is how much your money is getting weaker year over year. If you take everyone's budget, the average person will be spending that much more year over year. Individual circumstances will certainly vary, such as vegans not being impacted by egg shortages. In this case, beef supply has been reduced, causing prices to increase. This is unlikely to be a long term thing, and prices will return to "normal" (after regular inflation is taken into account) once supply returns to normal. That happened with eggs this year, prices were ridiculous at the start when hen populations were slashed due to disease outbreak, and now production has returned and prices are about where they were a year ago.

The meat shortage is a temporary thing caused by reduced herd populations and tariffs on Brazilian imports, but will likely last a lot longer than the egg supply costs because herds take longer to repopulate than chicken broods.

It's inane to expect everything to change prices in lockstep. We use averages to smooth over distortions in one area to get a better idea of what's going on more broadly (i.e. are increased prices part of a broader inflationary trend, or is one area seeing a unique spike?).

[–] BussyGyatt@feddit.org 2 points 6 hours ago* (last edited 6 hours ago)

We use averages to smooth over distortions in one area to get a better idea of what’s going on more broadly

"we" are using a different meaning of the word average I think. When I say mean, the point is to give an idea of where the "center" of the dataset is, not what the dataset is shaped like.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misuse_of_statistics

Misuse of Statistics: Using numbers in such a manner that – either by intent or through ignorance or carelessness – the conclusions are unjustified or incorrect.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyranny_of_averages

the often overlooked fact that the mean does not provide any information about the shape of the probability distribution of a data set or skewness, and that decisions or analysis based on only the mean—as opposed to median and standard deviation—may be faulty.

Are you implying the average person doesn’t understand averages?

That's an interesting thing to say. Tell me more about that.

[–] MystikIncarnate@lemmy.ca 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

It takes so much into account that it becomes almost meaningless for the average person.

[–] Valmond@lemmy.world 2 points 17 hours ago

So some people will get it all, some nothing, but the average person might struggle with it?