statistics

R.A. Fisher wrote that the purpose of statisticians was &quot;constructing a hypothetical infinite population of which the actual data are regarded as constituting a random sample.&quot; ( p. 311 <a href="https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/epdf/10.1098/rsta.1922.0009" rel="nofollow">here</a> ). In <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00031305.1998.10480528" rel="nofollow">The Zeroth Problem</a> Colin Mallows wrote &quot;As Fisher pointed out, statisticians earn their living by using two basic tricks-they regard data as being realizations of random variables, and they assume that they know an appropriate specification for these random variables.&quot;<br><br>Some of the pathological beliefs we attribute to techbros were already present in this view of statistics that started forming over a century ago. Our writing is just data; the real, important object is the “hypothetical infinite population” reflected in a large language model, which at base is a random variable. Stable Diffusion, the image generator, is called that because it is based on <a href="https://proceedings.mlr.press/v37/sohl-dickstein15.pdf" rel="nofollow">latent diffusion models</a>, which are a way of representing complicated distribution functions--the hypothetical infinite populations--of things like digital images. Your art is just data; it’s the latent diffusion model that’s the real deal. The entities that are able to identify the distribution functions (in this case tech companies) are the ones who should be rewarded, not the data generators (you and me).<br><br>So much of the dysfunction in today’s machine learning and AI points to how problematic it is to give statistical methods a privileged place that they don’t merit. We really ought to be calling out Fisher for his trickery and seeing it as such.<br><br><a href="/tags/ai/" rel="tag">#AI</a> <a href="/tags/genai/" rel="tag">#GenAI</a> <a href="/tags/generativeai/" rel="tag">#GenerativeAI</a> <a href="/tags/llm/" rel="tag">#LLM</a> <a href="/tags/stablediffusion/" rel="tag">#StableDiffusion</a> <a href="/tags/statistics/" rel="tag">#statistics</a> <a href="/tags/statisticalmethods/" rel="tag">#StatisticalMethods</a> <a href="/tags/diffusionmodels/" rel="tag">#DiffusionModels</a> <a href="/tags/machinelearning/" rel="tag">#MachineLearning</a> <a href="/tags/ml/" rel="tag">#ML</a><br>

<p>🆕 blog! “Now witness the power of this fully operational Fediverse!”</p><p>How can you measure the popularity of a social network site? Perhaps by counting the number of active accounts, or the quality of the discourse, or even how many people reply to your witty memes.</p><p>Me? I prefer to look at how many people visit my blog…</p><p>👀 Read more: <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/11/now-witness-the-power-of-this-fully-operational-fediverse/" rel="nofollow" class="ellipsis" title="shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/11/now-witness-the-power-of-this-fully-operational-fediverse/"><span class="invisible">https://</span><span class="ellipsis">shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/11/now-w</span><span class="invisible">itness-the-power-of-this-fully-operational-fediverse/</span></a><br>⸻<br><a href="/tags/activitypub/" rel="tag">#ActivityPub</a> <a href="/tags/bluesky/" rel="tag">#BlueSky</a> <a href="/tags/fediverse/" rel="tag">#fediverse</a> <a href="/tags/mastodon/" rel="tag">#mastodon</a> <a href="/tags/statistics/" rel="tag">#statistics</a></p>

<p>Do you excel in statistics and love cats? Want to help us with a research study? Please contact Sebastiaan ([email protected]). If you can help, authorship is guaranteed.</p><p><a href="/tags/statistics/" rel="tag">#statistics</a> <a href="/tags/stats/" rel="tag">#stats</a> <a href="/tags/cats/" rel="tag">#cats</a> <a href="/tags/science/" rel="tag">#science</a> <a href="/tags/research/" rel="tag">#research</a> <a href="/tags/phd/" rel="tag">#PhD</a></p>

<p>tomkyle/binning – Determine optimal number of bins 𝒌 for <a href="/tags/histogram/" rel="tag">#histogram</a> <a href="/tags/creation/" rel="tag">#creation</a> and optimal bin width 𝒉 using various statistical methods in <a href="/tags/php/" rel="tag">#PHP</a>.</p><p>Included methods: Sturges’ Rule, Doane’s Rule, Freedman-Diaconis Rule, Terrell-Scott’s Rule, Rice Rule, Scott’s Rule, and Square Root Rule. </p><p>GitHub: <a href="https://github.com/tomkyle/binning" rel="nofollow"><span class="invisible">https://</span>github.com/tomkyle/binning</a><br>Issues: <a href="https://github.com/tomkyle/binning/issues" rel="nofollow" class="ellipsis" title="github.com/tomkyle/binning/issues"><span class="invisible">https://</span><span class="ellipsis">github.com/tomkyle/binning/iss</span><span class="invisible">ues</span></a></p><p>Available on <a href="/tags/packagist/" rel="tag">#packagist</a> via <a href="/tags/composer/" rel="tag">#composer</a>. Heavily inspired by markrogoyski/math-php but written for <a href="/tags/php/" rel="tag">#PHP</a> 8.3+. — <a href="/tags/math/" rel="tag">#math</a> <a href="/tags/statistics/" rel="tag">#statistics</a></p>

<p>Do you love cats? Do you enjoy science and statistics? Willing to help cats a few hours a week by doing good science, from home?</p><p>Consider joining our team of volunteer scientists! </p><p><a href="/tags/statistics/" rel="tag">#statistics</a> <a href="/tags/science/" rel="tag">#science</a> <a href="/tags/cats/" rel="tag">#cats</a> <a href="/tags/phd/" rel="tag">#PhD</a><br>Boosts are greatly appreciated!</p>

<p>I am hiring!</p><p>I have a fully funded PhD position available for someone with an interest in logic and statistics, at Delft University of Technology (Netherlands).</p><p>Application deadline: 31 August 2025</p><p><a href="https://careers.tudelft.nl/job/Delft-PhD-Position-Symbolic-AI-and-Reasoning-Under-Uncertainty-2628-CD/824585702/" rel="nofollow" class="ellipsis" title="careers.tudelft.nl/job/Delft-PhD-Position-Symbolic-AI-and-Reasoning-Under-Uncertainty-2628-CD/824585702/"><span class="invisible">https://</span><span class="ellipsis">careers.tudelft.nl/job/Delft-P</span><span class="invisible">hD-Position-Symbolic-AI-and-Reasoning-Under-Uncertainty-2628-CD/824585702/</span></a></p><p><a href="/tags/academicjobs/" rel="tag">#AcademicJobs</a> <a href="/tags/academicmastodon/" rel="tag">#AcademicMastodon</a> <a href="/tags/getfedihired/" rel="tag">#GetFediHired</a> <a href="/tags/academicjob/" rel="tag">#AcademicJob</a> <a href="/tags/symbolicai/" rel="tag">#SymbolicAI</a> <a href="/tags/statistics/" rel="tag">#Statistics</a> <a href="/tags/ai/" rel="tag">#AI</a> <a href="/tags/constraintprogramming/" rel="tag">#ConstraintProgramming</a> <a href="/tags/combinatorialoptimisation/" rel="tag">#CombinatorialOptimisation</a> <a href="/tags/sensitivityanalysis/" rel="tag">#SensitivityAnalysis</a> <a href="/tags/formalmethods/" rel="tag">#FormalMethods</a> <a href="/tags/combinatorialoptimization/" rel="tag">#CombinatorialOptimization</a> <a href="/tags/delft/" rel="tag">#Delft</a> <a href="/tags/tudelft/" rel="tag">#TUDelft</a> <a href="/tags/academicchatter/" rel="tag">#AcademicChatter</a></p>

<p>What I’ve been reading this week ending 11 January 2026 <a href="https://jchyip.medium.com/what-ive-been-reading-this-week-ending-11-january-2026-2cfb895c1fd1" rel="nofollow" class="ellipsis" title="jchyip.medium.com/what-ive-been-reading-this-week-ending-11-january-2026-2cfb895c1fd1"><span class="invisible">https://</span><span class="ellipsis">jchyip.medium.com/what-ive-bee</span><span class="invisible">n-reading-this-week-ending-11-january-2026-2cfb895c1fd1</span></a> <a href="/tags/economics/" rel="tag">#economics</a> <a href="/tags/statistics/" rel="tag">#statistics</a> <a href="/tags/pricing/" rel="tag">#pricing</a> <a href="/tags/vaccines/" rel="tag">#vaccines</a> <a href="/tags/lean/" rel="tag">#lean</a> <a href="/tags/liberalism/" rel="tag">#liberalism</a></p>

#<a href="https://libera.site/search?tag=Friendica" rel="nofollow">Friendica</a> #<a href="https://libera.site/search?tag=Statistics" rel="nofollow">Statistics</a> 2026-02-01 07:00 CEST<br>Number of active instances: 213<br>Number of users: 20 869<br>Number of statuses: 2 870 240<br>Number of new users last 1D: 1<br>Number of new statuses last 1D: 107<br> <br>#<a href="https://libera.site/search?tag=Fediverse" rel="nofollow">Fediverse</a>

<p>What I’ve been reading this week ending 15 March 2026 <a href="https://jchyip.medium.com/what-ive-been-reading-this-week-ending-15-march-2026-97dbd2fb1a28" rel="nofollow" class="ellipsis" title="jchyip.medium.com/what-ive-been-reading-this-week-ending-15-march-2026-97dbd2fb1a28"><span class="invisible">https://</span><span class="ellipsis">jchyip.medium.com/what-ive-bee</span><span class="invisible">n-reading-this-week-ending-15-march-2026-97dbd2fb1a28</span></a> <a href="/tags/housing/" rel="tag">#housing</a> <a href="/tags/climatechange/" rel="tag">#ClimateChange</a> <a href="/tags/ai/" rel="tag">#AI</a> <a href="/tags/aging/" rel="tag">#aging</a> <a href="/tags/statistics/" rel="tag">#statistics</a> <a href="/tags/management/" rel="tag">#management</a></p>

<p><a href="https://lispy-gopher-show.itch.io/dl-roc-lisp/devlog/1465107/shark-restaurant-dl-roc-dot-lisp-explained-deep-learning-receiver-operating-characteristic-part-2-simple-version" rel="nofollow" class="ellipsis" title="lispy-gopher-show.itch.io/dl-roc-lisp/devlog/1465107/shark-restaurant-dl-roc-dot-lisp-explained-deep-learning-receiver-operating-characteristic-part-2-simple-version"><span class="invisible">https://</span><span class="ellipsis">lispy-gopher-show.itch.io/dl-r</span><span class="invisible">oc-lisp/devlog/1465107/shark-restaurant-dl-roc-dot-lisp-explained-deep-learning-receiver-operating-characteristic-part-2-simple-version</span></a></p><p><a href="/tags/itchio/" rel="tag">#itchio</a> <a href="/tags/gamedev/" rel="tag">#gamedev</a> <a href="/tags/programming/" rel="tag">#programming</a> <a href="/tags/theory/" rel="tag">#theory</a> completely explainable game-embeddable <a href="/tags/deeplearning/" rel="tag">#deepLearning</a> system using <a href="/tags/roc/" rel="tag">#roc</a> <a href="/tags/statistics/" rel="tag">#statistics</a> .</p><p>I coded this one simply and iteratively, since a few people worked on reimplementing my <a href="/tags/commonlisp/" rel="tag">#commonLisp</a> code to-be-simpler.</p><p>The gist is that I show that deep learning updates, and indicate training as well are a simple true-positive/true-negative/false-positive-false-negative equation of the previous time step in an eminently explorable way. <a href="/tags/dl/" rel="tag">#DL</a> <a href="/tags/ai/" rel="tag">#AI</a></p>

<p><a href="/tags/lispygopherclimate/" rel="tag">#lispyGopherClimate</a> <a href="/tags/live/" rel="tag">#live</a> <a href="/tags/technology/" rel="tag">#technology</a> <a href="/tags/podcast/" rel="tag">#podcast</a> (?!) <a href="https://toobnix.org/w/jQkCWCeFNRL9Utcr2GWurM" rel="nofollow" class="ellipsis" title="toobnix.org/w/jQkCWCeFNRL9Utcr2GWurM"><span class="invisible">https://</span><span class="ellipsis">toobnix.org/w/jQkCWCeFNRL9Utcr</span><span class="invisible">2GWurM</span></a><br>Chat live in <a href="/tags/lambdamoo/" rel="tag">#lambdaMOO</a> as always <a href="https://lambda.moo.mud.org/" rel="nofollow"><span class="invisible">https://</span>lambda.moo.mud.org/</a><br>(@join screwtape<br>&quot;hey<br>)</p><p>- I release NZ government secrets about <a href="/tags/ai/" rel="tag">#AI</a> and <a href="/tags/llms/" rel="tag">#LLMs</a> senior managers keep sending me</p><p>- I start /actually/ multimooing my own personal moos LambdaMOO</p><p>- Otherwise, my <a href="/tags/commonlisp/" rel="tag">#commonLisp</a> brain is entirely inside my <a href="/tags/dl/" rel="tag">#DL</a> <a href="/tags/deeplearning/" rel="tag">#DeepLearning</a> <a href="/tags/roc/" rel="tag">#roc</a> <a href="/tags/statistics/" rel="tag">#statistics</a> original formulation <a href="https://lispy-gopher-show.itch.io/dl-roc-lisp" rel="nofollow" class="ellipsis" title="lispy-gopher-show.itch.io/dl-roc-lisp"><span class="invisible">https://</span><span class="ellipsis">lispy-gopher-show.itch.io/dl-r</span><span class="invisible">oc-lisp</span></a></p><p><span class="h-card"><a href="https://climatejustice.social/@kentpitman" class="u-url mention" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">@<span>kentpitman</span></a></span> featuring.</p>