Slashdot Mirror
Voters Swayed By Candidates Who Share Their Looks
iandoh writes "Stanford researchers have found that voters are subconsciously swayed by candidates who share their facial features. In three experiments, researchers at the Virtual Human Interaction Lab worked with cheap, easy-to-use computer software to morph pictures of about 600 test subjects with photos of politicians. And they kept coming up with the same results: For the would-be voters who weren't very familiar with the candidates or in perfect lockstep with their positions or political parties, the facial similarity was enough to clinch their votes."
I work for a company, that is run mostly by women, but the thing is that all the women that work there, they ALL Look like clones. Or they get hired because they look like the owners, as to give them the comfort in what "looks familiar" or to the fact the women, mimic the looks ...no, they all just look so similar makes me thinks it is more common than we think.
I shall stand on the 'butt-ugly' platform. I'm a certain winner based on this research.
Protoplasm. Quiet Protoplasm. I like quiet protoplasm.
...why Cowboy Neal gets all the votes in the slashdot polls.
I voted for Kucinich!
On a more serious note, is this surprising to anyone?
Was kinda freaked out by that picture in TFA ? HES MULTIPLYING!
Where does the correlation come from then? Unless you suggest that people who look the same ACTUALLY have the same political views.
I've heard statistics from some sources as high as 97% of black voters will be voting for Obama, just google for some of it it's out there. Even if they're off and lets say it's only 85%, still.
If 85% of white people voted for McCain, it would be considered racist.
Just saying.
To all the people tagging this "correlation is not causation," do you even know what you're talking about? This was a randomized experiment.
I'm not saying this is a perfect study -- there might be plenty of other things wrong with it. But the phrase "correlation is not causation" has an actual meaning. It is not just a synonym for "I had a kneejerk reaction to dislike this study but I can't say why."
Frankly, I kind of doubt it. But you never know...
It drives me nuts that Slashdotters always bring up "correlation does not imply causation" any time any sort of experiment is mentioned even if no one is even trying to assert a causative relationship.
"Correlation does not imply causation" seems to be one of those ideas that a lot of people seem to somehow be proud of knowing and as such try to apply even when they aren't needed. Other examples of these sorts of ideas on Slashdot are the term "prior art" and car analogies.
This research is totally bogus. I just like to vote for the ugly candidate.
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
Mark this article "correlation IS causation" -- simply because it's so ludicrous. ;)
Yes, of course "correlation is causation". If you look at the data, the two are so tightly correlated, than causation can be inferred.
That may be happening because the headline's misleading (as usual); it should be
/. wouldn't get as many "Um, wha??" clicks, and the more cynical of us would tag the story "noshitsherlock" ;-)
Undecided Voters Swayed by Candidates Who Share Their Looks
But then,
Hey -- There's your idea for a social experiment!
Where they placed a set of eyes on those candy/donation boxes that companies have at reception and found that people were less likely to take candy without paying than if the box didn't have the eyes.
Maybe if I placed a picture of angry eyes on my cubicle everyone would keep away...
Task Mangler
No wonder politicans are two-faced - they're trying to double their votes.
I've wondered for a while if part of what makes white voters more likely to accept Obama as the first black president is the fact that, despite his dark skin color, he has very European facial features. Andrew Sullivan has recently been posting pictures of Obama's (white) grandfather, to whom the presidential candidate bears a striking resemblance.
Obviously, it's impossible to give a truly satisfying answer to such a counterfactual, but I can't help but suspect that if Obama had more stereotypically African features---you know what I mean---that he would not be in the position he is in now.
I don't believe in time. It's a grand conspiracy designed to sell watches.
"correlation is not causation" is one of the most overused mantras of slashdot users who want to be more skeptical than thou. Yes it's true that correlation does not always equal causation, but causation does tend to result in correlation.
It's been shown that people are more attracted to people with similar facial features when choosing mates, it makes some sense that people would feel better about choosing a leader with similar facial features for the same biological reasons.
Now I'm not saying that this hypothesis is clearly true, just that we don't have to jump all over it.
It's sad when choosing an installation directory on your own qualifies you as an "advanced user."
...most slashdotters look kinda like Cheney.
Table-ized A.I.
Barack Obama looks exactly like his grandfather, Stanley Dunham, except Barack's skin is darker and his hair curlier.
Obama is half "Black" and half "White". He's been called "Black" so many times, it's only fair to call him "White". Especially because he looks just like his White family.
--
make install -not war
I read this as Voters Swayed By Canadians Who Share Their Looks.
I was imagining a Canadian double of me at the polling place screaming "Vote for McCain, eh?"
...and I already for him!
correlation is not caucasian?
The usage of the original phrase really bothers me.
While correlation does not prove causation, it sure does imply causation. It's probably about as close to the definition of imply that I can come up with. The only way I can see the phrase making sense is to use the logic definition of suggest as a logically necessary consequence. Then the original usage may have held a meaning of While causation implies correlation, correlation does not imply causation, basically saying if there is causation, then correlation will follow. So finding correlations is extremely useful, but picking out the root cause of the correlation can be quite difficult, especially when there are multiple factors in play all feeding back on each other.
I'll never make that mistake again, reading the experts' opinions. - Feynman
Come to think of it, that might explain why there's always a "CowboyNeal" option in the polls...
While correlation does not prove causation, it sure does imply causation.
More simply, causation causes correlation. If you don't have correlation, then you can't claim causation.
More to the point, causation is highly correlated with correlation (rho=0.977).
Problems arise when people claim that correlation causes causation. Since causation is a boolean variable while correlation is real-valued, with suitable rounding, then yes, it's true.
It's all very simple really.
Yes it's true that correlation does not always equal causation, but causation does tend to result in correlation.
err. it's a bit more than "tend to result in"
If causation, then correlation.
or equivalently...
If no correlation, than no causation.
I totally agree. Every single scientific article reporting "A linked with B" gets this ridiculous tag. Almost no scientist every says "A causes B" because they obviously already understand that correlation does not imply correlation. However, correlation also does not imply "not causation." Any reputable scientist and journal will report results of the form "Here is the data. A appears to be statistically linked with B. Here are several hypotheses as to why, however these are speculative and require further study."
Furthermore, causality is something that a lot of very smart statisticians do spend a lot of time studying. It's not inconceivable that in the future people will be able to make concrete statistical statements about causality with confidence intervals and the works. What will the mantra be then?
Anyway, correlation's not *that* good of a measure of (interesting and nonlinear) dependence between (non-Gaussian) variables anyway. Mutual information is the ticket.
Ok, done with my rant.
Nonperiodic Central Trajectory
People tend to like people who are similar to themselves. The old saw "birds of a feather" bit actually rings true a fair amount of the time.
Of course, there's no guarantee that the person who looks vaguely similar to me actually DOES share my views, but if I have no other information to go with, then it's probably a better indicator of who to go with than a coin toss.
Genetics and life experience work together to shape our looks, and those two things also shape our attitudes and actions.
The best explanation is though that despite the great efforts we go through to try and train it out of people, all other things being equal they still prefer in-groups to out-groups. The root of this likely comes from things such as kin selection and the generally tribal nature of early man.
>More to the point, causation is highly correlated with correlation (rho=0.977).
Interesting study, but I find it odd that the end result defies logic. Their relationship claims it's possible to have 0.05% causation with 0.00% correlation?! (note the offset in their y-intercept). Am I missing something?
And what the hell is that journal?
"Forthcoming in the International Journal of Observeration, Knowledge and Evidence, Vol. 27 (December, 2007)."
Basic searching came up with nothing. Does it even exist?
anyhoo...
I wonder which candidate a blind person votes for?
I'm not a Troll, it's reverse psychology.
Maybe if I placed a picture of angry eyes on my cubicle everyone would keep away...
I put up a printout of my level 70 Hunter toting an Ornate Khorium Rifle in my cube. Hasn't helped me. :-(
Now that this has been scientifically proven, go and select your candidate.
McCain will get the votes of people that look like the Crypt Keeper?
I like it.
"Suppose you were an idiot...and suppose you were a member of Congress...but I repeat myself." Mark Twain
people jump on it because they think if somethings printed on the internets it must be true.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
It does, but there are innumerable junk studies out there that do nothing but grab some handy statistics and pull bullshit conclusions out of the air. The news media is only too happy to uncritically report on them as well, exposing an unsuspecting public to ridiculously conclusions that may harm rather than help them. Skepticism is fully warranted.
I would go so far as to suggest a change of labeling, so such "studies" won't be so easily confused with actual controlled experiments, and phenomenon that are have known causal relationships that are well understood...
No, I don't believe drinking a glass of red wine every day is going to add 20 years to your life.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
The sample sizes used are so ludicrously small compared to how many numerical possibilities exist to test for that anything you get out this would be a joke no matter the circumstances.
So this explains McCain's inexplicable popularity amongst Gnomes.
The black guy.
The one that sounds like them.
Most human behaviour can be explained in terms of identity.
It's not inconceivable that in the future people will be able to make concrete statistical statements about causality
For a starter: Path Analysis (as of 1918)
link
CC.
TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
ugly crooked toothed people of questionable gender to keep electing this one then. . http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://wmmbb.files.wordpress.com/2007/03/clarke-and-bush.jpg&imgrefurl=http://wmmbb.wordpress.com/2007/03/23/1406/&h=322&w=435&sz=27&hl=en&start=2&um=1&usg=__b9OhQLnbvYa2tx25Y5_gyFx73G4=&tbnid=4TKw75oEfWu3sM:&tbnh=93&tbnw=126&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dugly%2Bhelen%2Bclarke%26ndsp%3D20%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26safe%3Dactive%26rls%3Dcom.microsoft:en-nz%26sa%3DN
. .
Could you pick out of a line-up a visually foreign person you've only just met? For example, I'm of Indonesian descent, 3rd generation Canadian. I'm far better at distinguishing caucasians than they are at distinguishing any asians.
I can't imagine what middle-of-the-road Americans must inperpret from seeing the two candidates. A black man with white features, or an old geezer.
My first thought would be "what, they couldn't find any normal people to run for president?"
Along that same line, I have to ask, "what, they had to go to Alaska to find a running mate for McCain?!"
War as we knew it was obsolete
Nothing could beat complete denial
- Emily Haines
While correlation does not prove causation, it sure does imply causation.
Yes, like having to cope with spectacles causes you to be more intelligent.
CC.
TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
It's like when they claim that applying the brakes of a car make it go slower or stop. However, this can not be taken to mean that any car that goes slower has its brakes applied. Some cars also slow down or stop because they ran out of fuel, the engine cut out, they ran into a tree, or a multitude of other reasons. (However, it is still true for the vast majority of cases where the car slows down or stops, the brakes where used by the driver.)
And I surely hope that this has not been thought of by someone previously, because as true as hell I just sucked it out of my thumb this minute.
Free, as in your money being freed from the confines of your account.
Since I guess she mistook her supporters for "deer in the headlights"...
It has also been shown this this is not true. The way it was proven wrong was by people first predicting who one person would find more attractive and then looking if it was actually the case. It wasn't.
The reason that people think this is true is because humans are pretty good in recognizing faces and are also good in remembering things that stand out.
So if they see two people who are a couple and look alike, they will remember this better then people who did not look alike.
The same goes for e.g. Friday the 13th. If you break your leg on that day, you will most likely remember the day for a very long time. If it happened on Thursday the 12th, you won't remember the date.
Obviously I have not read the article, but unless they said first who somebody would vote for and then look if they were right, it is completely bogus. So yes, we should jump over it and show why it is not true.
Otherwise you will get people who say about reading tea: "Now I'm not saying that this hypothesis is clearly true, just that we don't have to jump all over it." just because once in a while they get it right.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
In order for the test to work (correct me if I'm wrong), the only factor that they would have been told is that they were voting for a politician in an experiment. When people have nothing else to make a decision on, they will generally try to pick something, no matter how superficial it may seem.
But when voting for someone in the real world, more factors come into play and this test doesn't say anything about how much of an influence this trait plays, which is just as important as the experiment itself if you want to find out what it means in real elections.
It is sad that elections are decided by the marginally stupid and vain. This makes politicians cater to the lowest common denominator (which, in fact, most of them are). All this bruhahaha regarding "Joe the plumber" is a case in point.
Perhaps we need a different system? One in which those who have opinions and are "smart" are the marginal voter and make a difference? Ergo, if were to switch to an "online direct democracy" -- one in which decisions made by congress were made by a vote cast by each citizen (technologially, this is feasible after a long lull from Athens) -- pehraps, the actual voting public for most decisions would diminish to those who care about the issue.
I'm sorry, but this has been known for ages. May I suggest "Influence, Science and Practice" from Robert Cialdini for an overview of the area of influence. It's an amazing mix of simplicity/readability and excellent science.
I basically agree: The tag is used way to often and probably by people who do not have a better idea why correlation exists other than writing it up to coincidence.
However, your argument is flawed by a common logical fallacy. It is true that causation tends to result in correlation (actually more than "tends to"), but you cannot deduct from this that correlation is a sign for causation, especially if there is more than one possible chain of causation leading to the same correlation.
It is true: The street is wet when it rains. However, if the street is wet, it does not have rain.
That may be happening because the headline's misleading (as usual)
YAIMSH
Lock the wife and the dog in the boot of the car.
Return one hour later.
Who's happy to see you?
The Freudian undertones alone are astounding.
Where does the correlation come from then? Unless you suggest that people who look the same ACTUALLY have the same political views.
The correlationisnotcausation tag really winds me up because correlation DOES imply causation. If A and B are correlated then either A causes B, B causes A, or C causes both A and B (or it's a chance finding but that's what p-values are for). So once you have a correlation its just a case of working out which causal relationship is true. I'll leave this specific case as an exercise for the reader.
Do people favour people who look like themselves, or (more likely) favour people who look like the members of their family? Comparing the politician portraits with ones of the subjects' parents might be more to the point.
I think you will feel a lot better, when you explain that you are African-American to your parents. They will be more accepting than you expect.
Especially your mother.
Your father might give her some dirty looks for a while.
Pity poor me: I favor Obama, but also think that German Chancellor Angela Merkel is doing a rather fine job. So I have to tell my mother that, not only that I am African-American, but that her son is really a daughter as well!
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
Obama/Biden? McCain/Palin? Nader? H. Ron Paul?
Fuck 'em.
Vote for yourself!
Plant dippy looking campaign signs on your front lawn with your name on it.
Oh, your name is not on the ballot? My tip: ANYTHING is possible with a Diebold voting machine!
I plan on becoming the next county dog catcher, myself.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
...is gonna vote for the McCain/Palin ticket?
Try not. Do... or do not. There is no try. ~Yoda
Isn't _every_ voter undecided before he/she actually decides who to vote for?
Apart from the those who vote the party, not the candidate, of course.
So, they don't know a person's POV & policies and prolly don't care. Neither do they have a pre-set opinion. Then, you let those people choose from a few incarnations of the same person. One of them looks like the test subject does. They like that person best. How is that news? How is this not completely obvious?
Because it is very simplistic.
C -> D
D -> F
D -> E
E -> G
G -> A
F -> B
In this relationship C -> A and C -> B
But in order to pinpoint C, you have to work back from A and B via E,F and D. Verifying a C is relatively easy. Finding C can be very nasty. And if there are loops involved it can be a lot nastier.
Sure, correlation implies causation. But which one?
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power lost.
And rightly so.
Most science stories posted to Slashdot are junk science studies which use the law of large numbers and fuzzy statistics to promote the most dubious of arguments under the pretence of scientific inquiry. Many studies take correlation coefficients of 0.5 to be "significant". What a joke. How long is the scientific community going to continue to call this rigour?
Rubbish! Is that what the world construes from their results? Is that what they wish the world to construe from them? No. The vast majority of these studies are putting forward their correlation as proof of causation. That is what they want people to construe from the study. Look at any half baked studies on race, gender, abortion or any topic that sells newspapers. Why do you think people are performing such studies? Because they believe further inquiry is merited? No. It's because they have an opinion, and want to justify it. So they turn to science to legitimise their position. This constant and ongoing abuse of science is sickening.
Slashdotters are right to point out the Correlation is not, and never will be causation. Never, never, never, never, never. If you want to show causation, then you must have a model and you must subject it to experiment. Experiment! Not statistical mumbo-jumbo.
Listen to Zombie Feynman's wisdom. "Ideas are tested by experiment. Everything else is bookkeeping". This is bookkeeping, not science. Correlation is not causation, and this story deserves that tag. I don't know how many times I'm going to end up linking to this page, but here it is again. This study is Cargo Cult Science. The form is perfect, but it is only an empty imitation of real scientific inquiry. Stop giving it more credit and credence that it deserves.
May the Maths Be with you!
For some reason this reminds me of a Star Trek: Voyager episode - 2x23 - The Thaw.
"You're different, I don't know anything about you. You're not on the system."
"I would be pleased to tell you all about myself another time at a more appropriate time. For now suffice it to say that I'm here by a miracle of technology. Now let's get down to the issues, shall we?"
"How am I supposed to negotiate if I don't know what you're thinking?"
"I have a very trustworthy face."
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
So become the next American president all you have to do is to be fat...
:)
- Sorry, I just couldn't help it...
But in order to pinpoint C, you have to work back from A and B via E,F and D. Verifying a C is relatively easy. Finding C can be very nasty. And if there are loops involved it can be a lot nastier.
Sure, correlation implies causation. But which one?
You're right of course, but you don't have to understand the complete chain to discover C. It helps to think it through obviously, but you can easily try adjusting for things (in this case like demographic factors, genetics, etc) until you hit one that accounts for the association, and then work forwards to try to work out why, although understanding why (ie knowing D,E,F) is not often necessary, (for example if C is genetic).
The people that use that tag almost never know what they're talking about. (And no, dipshits, the fact that there's a strong correlation between not knowing what you're talking about and using that tag does not imply using the tag is caused by it, and neither is it in any way "insightful" to point that out.)
Slashdotters are right to point out the Correlation is not, and never will be causation. Never, never, never, never, never. If you want to show causation, then you must have a model and you must subject it to experiment. Experiment! Not statistical mumbo-jumbo.
I think you are wrong. Epidemiology and observational science have given up a lot without the need for experimentation (we know smoking causes lung cancer, though this has never been directly established through an experiment, since it would be massively unethical). Correlation does imply causation, as I've pointed out in an earlier comment, the hard part is working out what the causal relationships are (ie A->B, B->A or C->A and C->B, these are the ONLY explanations for statistically significant correlation).
The reverse possibility B->A here is nonsense, because voting patterns cannot affect your looks, and the way this study was conducted (you can read the details) pretty well rules out the confounding factor 'C', leaving us with A->B as the only plausible explanation.
I'd like to see you try to refute this (without resorting to insults or rhetoric), particularly if you can think of a way for variables to be correlated without some form of causal relationship as I've described.
Correlation may be Caucasian, instead of causation.
is this the psychological basis of racism, then? when you don't have other facts to go on, you drift toward whatever is most like -- or least UNlike -- yourself?
No. There are people who will vote for their party, even if they put a horse's ass up for election. No "decision" is made.
I can give you an example, but George Bush probably feels bad enough about now, what with the country practically a flaming ruin as he prepares to leave office. But, I suppose there are some that look at the results of his presidency and say "Mission Accomplished".
You are welcome on my lawn.
"Correlation is not causation" is the new "FUD" - it's something people can yell when they dislike something but can't figure out how to refute it, without ever really understanding that the term has an actual, specific meaning.
Actually, some people on Slashdot seem to take it as a handy way to refute results they don't like, and also to appear smart.
But does that mean that there are sufficient "pit bull with lipstick" soccer moms to sway the vote for the Repugnicans?
One swallow does not a fellatrix make
Blacks voting for Obama are mainly voting their interest, and Obama is an amazing candidate by many measures. If someone like Clarence Thomas were running for president do you think many blacks would be voting for him? Me neither.
Blacks in the US *have* to think pragmatically. They can't afford (or they act as if they can't afford, which I wish most folks would do) to elect officials who are going to play shenanigans with their sons' and daughters' bodies in a godless (you heard me) war over oil. Black folk by and large send their sons and daughters to college to get law and medical degree, and they vote for candidates who reflect their interest.
blog
However, correlation also does not imply "not causation." I agree. I have a plan to fight global warming by putting polar bears in the tropics. Study after study has proven there is a high correlation between polar bears and colder temperatures yet people keep whining "correlation is not causation" and try to block my funding.
It is statistically possible to take an arbitrarily large group of people and have them flip a coint an arbitrarily large number of times and come up with a result where every man flips all heads and every woman flips all tails.
It's incredibly unlikely, but not impossible.
Assuming you don't already know that the odds of any given flip of the coin are 50/50, you could draw a correlation between gender and the result of a coin flip, however, as we know from basic probability there is absolutely no causation in this result, merely very large improbability.
So, as you can see, causation implies correlation, and for a sufficiently large data set correlation nearly always but not always implies some sort of underlying causation.
Of course you'll trust someone which looks like they is from your family / closely related more than someone who's not.
Makes perfect sense and makes me wonder why some people decided that "correlationisnotcausation" was a valid tag for this story. Would be intresting to hear their theory about why this happens if it's not because of the similar looks ...
Haha, don't feel too bad about it. Slashdot will take any opportunity to throw out a meme :)
10 FILL MUG WITH COFFEE
20 DRINK COFFEE
30 GOTO 10
Sadly, if this is true, I'll probably end up find myself inexorably drawn to vote for this guy.
For conscience is the wound, and there's naught to staunch it
I'm not black, and I'm not ancient, and if you want to include VPs, I'm not female. None of them look like me, so they all suck!
Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
I'm going to write-in CowboyNeal in November. Take that establishment!
Yep. I had a boss who had long hair and who had hired me for a customer service position back in the 90s when I had long hair. Every other woman she hired also had long hair. I thought the hair length was incidental until she got a short hair cut and started pressuring all of her employees to cut their hair. I transferred departments to get away from her nuisances.
Dress codes don't have much of a real impact on performance as long as employees don't take advantage and wear clothing that is not appropriate and clean.
However, as long as no one expects me to wear the Evil that is also known as panty-hose, I can deal.
the actual voting public for most decisions would diminish to those who care about the issue.
This might be a good idea, but it is not foolproof, because this is pretty much how lobbying works today: Organizations that care deeply about an issue -- whether it be corn ethanol, bridges in Alaska, representation of a particular ethnic group, or something else -- are the ones who dedicate resources (in the case of online voting, this would be time) to making sure that they get their way. The general public does not. The basic issue is the problem of diffuse costs and concentrated benefits. That said, it is possible that online voting could help this situation, by decreasing the cost of involvement.
A different line of argument might question your assertion that web users are smarter. Perhaps you think this because you read the comments on Slashdot instead of on Youtube? ;-)
Our company had a very strict pantyhose rule when I first started here; one lady in accounting was actually sent home for wearing shoes with no hose - with a PANT SUIT. Not even a skirt. Just showing a bit of ankle. We only recently have been allowed to wear open-toed shoes in summer.
If you want happy workers, let them dress comfortably. Sheesh.
The House Between - Original Sci-Fi Series
Who the hell tagged this story "correlationisnotcausation"? Do you just spit that out every time you see any study data whatsoever?
What relationship could facial features and political credulity possibly have, other than a causative one?
DRM: Terminator crops for your mind!
Even more so, you'll never understand the chain without implying that C->A. The implication is what indicates that there is a thread to investigate.
implicate->indicate->investigate
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
I read the Title as "Voters Swayed By Canadians Who Share Their Looks", and I was thinking wha?!
Last night I played a blank tape at full volume. The mime next door went nuts.
I've been told I look like Sarah Palin, but I am not particularly fond of her. Sure as heck wouldn't vote for her. I'm going to be very careful when I buy new glasses not to get ones that enhance the resemblance.
Your fantasies contain the seeds of important concepts.
...of most all the older voters (over 40 yrs old).
And, there's slightly more of those age group than there are of under-40 voters when you measure strictly by age.
This election is going to be a lot tighter than most folks think.
Be worried.
Will this simply be a matter of the younger voters going for Obama then?
--
Luck is just skill you didn't know you had.
You dropped the word 'voted' from your sentence the same way GOP agents aim to lose/drop/ignore/prevent millions of Democratic votes in November. The election is already stolen. Why the hell isn't the television media all over this? Hands are dripped red.
--The only mention is the utterly benign ACORN nonsense the Republicans are hollering about, which as it happens, is simply a case of the psychopath blaming the victim for its own crimes.
12-year old mentality pouting bullies whose arguing tactics involve repeating lies loudly, ignoring facts, and disobeying social rules until they are physically restrained. . , these are the people who are determining the future of our world.
I know an old, crusty, mean old German bitch of a woman who is a total misery to be near and who seems to derive her only satisfaction in life from ruining people's days. I just learned this week that she was a card-carrying member of the Hitler Youth when she was a kid. Golly. But that's not the frustrating part. These evil bastards who never had any intention of playing fair in a real, genuine democratic society are the last ones to be punished when dictatorial fascism takes over. Their comfort zone exists within the muted gray-scale of harshness and general misery in all social benchmarks. The average racist inbred moron will probably not be shot or starved by the results of their actions. And if they are starved and mistreated, they will handily blame it on the liberals.
When can we brush aside the nonsense and recognize that some 'adults' are really just learning-disabled assholes, and give them only the limited rights we give to children? Why on earth are we allowing them ANY kind of decision making powers? They have plunged us into idiotic wars and they have plundered the economy and worst of all, they refuse to acknowledge that any of it was their fault. Forehead Tattoos for Retarded Assholes.
-FL
Exactly, it's like trying to go drag racing in a Lada.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
And a blind and deaf one..?
"The one who smells like him"
And the blind and deaf and olfactory-impaired? ..
http://dilemma.gulecha.org - My philospohical short film.
I wrote in CowboyNeal as my choice for school board member year before last. He had to be better than the idiots who were running.
Uh, "if it looks roughly mouse-shaped according to my infra-red sensitive pit, eat it"? --Chris Burke 09-08-10
Just like there are people who post without reading the parent. Reading comprehension is a wonderful thing.
"Educate the mind but never at the expense of the soul."~Blessed Basil Moreau
I agree, it's more of a slashdot meme than insightful. It's kind of like tagging every biology article "whatcouldpossiblygowrong" even when the answer is "no more than could go wrong from any other human activity, like folding laundry."
Typically it's called up when no one is attempting to say causation. They're basically warning people of overinterpreting data when they have clearly not overinterpreted data.
Its no contest down there as to who looks like the average population..
The idea that Americans can be so persuaded by looks is daunting; especially as it pertains to choosing the leaders of our nation. What does this say about the citizens of our nation? That we are a vein and uneducated. At first I thought this study was ridiculous for the fact that it didn't state any background information about the test subjects. However, if the study did only test subjects who did claim to be independent and were not associated with any political party, the study holds more validity. Still, I find this article to be insulting. Every citizen who votes should educate themselves on the potential candidates and vote in a professional and dignified way. Not simple because of looks. We should hold ourselves to a higher responsibility when it comes to electing our nation's leader.
Correlation does not imply causation in a scientific sense, although it could in an English language sense.
The best way to put it would be that correlation is necessary but not sufficient for causation, which is what is implied (haha) by the tag.
As pointed out earlier in this thread, the linked article is about a randomized experiment.
Imagine that you have been diagnosed with a potentially fatal disease. The research shows that if you go untreated, you have a 75% chance of dying within a year. Your doctor offers you a treatment that, in well-run clinical trials, has been shown to reduce the chance of death to 25%. Do you take it, or dismiss it as "a joke"? Because those probabilities express a correlation of r=.5 between taking the drug (vs. not) and living (vs. dying).
Medical and behavioral science study phenomena that are inherently complex, noisy, and non-deterministic. Your standards for what constitutes a meaningful effect size have to be adjusted accordingly.
While there might be a rash of undecided midwestern voters going for Obama because of his big ears, I think overall this particular election is unusual enough that effects like this won't really make a difference one way or another.
I have decided to respond to your post with the refutation you seek. In short, the Right Ascension of the planet Saturn in the night sky is correllated with the S & P 500 stock market index. The correlation coefficient is 0.88.
True, my example is somewhat facetious, but just how far removed is it from the junk studies posted on Slashdot nearly every day? Why is this (apparently quite strong) correlation to be rejected, yet even weaker one accepted in other fields. What is the essential difference here? Do we only accept correlations between variables that our "common sense" tells us should be related? Is that science?
No. You cannot infer or imply causation from correlation. It is a false premise from the outset. Only an experiment, a real experiment can establish causation. Anything else is second or third rate material which cannot and should not be accepted by anyone without further proof.
Correlation is not causation. It does not imply causation. It is a statistical technique that has been consistently abused and misapplied by charlatans for decades and proves exactly nothing. In the hands of many, if not most, who use it correlation is isomorphic to numerology, and should be soundly rejected by any serious scientist.
Therefore, our mantras are just fine, and I see no reason to alter them.
May the Maths Be with you!
The correlationisnotcausation tag really winds me up because correlation DOES imply causation.
:-)
But this greatly depends on what you actually mean by correlation! In the article's case, "correlation" simply means co-existence; I don't see any other relation stated. So I'd say nobody brought any causation into play.
Now, if there was some more complex relation -- actually a relation *between* A and B, originating from their own qualities -- then that kind of correlation could indeed imply a causation process also there. (With A or B or a C as the "causer".) But mere coexistence doesn't imply anything -- you just have apple A and orange X in the same space of observation.
So off the cuff I'd just reply "Nopers." to you.
It drives me nuts that Slashdotters always bring up "correlation does not imply causation" any time any sort of experiment is mentioned even if no one is even trying to assert a causative relationship.
:-)
I guess most of those are like me -- they see countless examples of correlation blindly equaled to causation every day in their real life, and it irks them no end, because they are logical thinkers and irked by such violations of the unwritten rules of thinking and understanding. So they are trigger-happy to shoot that tag at everything that even remotely resembles a suitable target, even when it's clearly overboard.
If you asked me, why yes, I am proud for knowing that and spotting where-ever a false causation is being sold to me. Colour me a geek or something.
But I'm 100% with you about car analogies. They are like...
I'd guess that trolls would have the hardest time deciding between Obama and McCain, they're both such a perfect match.
"And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the World"
1 John 4:14
If you want to show causation, then you must have a model and you must subject it to experiment
In the case of this study, this appears to be what was done. It was a randomized study with a control group and an experimental group. They kept everything else the same, and changed one variable. What is "wrong" with what they have done?
Now, I agree that there is a lot of junk science out there, and a large part of this is the result of confirmation bias (and more generally, a bias towards positive rather than negative results; it's better for one's career).
But from the little I can tell about this study from the pop article, I'm not sure what there is to complain about here.
Just wanted to add how I love Slashdot. Only here can you take a Cosmopolitan grade scientific study and end up with a good thorough discussion on correlation and causation. Three cheers! :-)
It is true: The street is wet when it rains. However, if the street is wet, it does not have rain.
True. But I think the point is that the probability that it rained given that the street is wet is greater than the unconditional probability of rain. It's just Bayes' rule.
But, I suppose there are some that look at the results of his presidency and say "Mission Accomplished".
Osama bin Laden, I would guess.
It doesn't mean existence in the context of this article, it means the probability of one event (voting) is higher given the occurrence of another (similar face). So a traditional Pearson correlation wouldn't be applicable, but a tetrachoric correlation can be calculated quite adequately. There is plenty of room for causal relationships to be implied.
and I'm not even a woman! (Just don't tell my wife, ok?)
ba-dum cchhhhhinnggg...
10 FILL MUG WITH COFFEE
20 DRINK COFFEE
30 GOTO 10
He seems to be black enough for most blacks. Gallup has been showing between 89 and 93% of America's blacks supporting Obama for months, compared to 48-55% whites supporting McCain. For some reason, this hasn't been the slightest bit newsworthy in the mainstream media.
It isn't newsworthy to anyone who has more than a 4 year memory of politics.
According to CNN exit polls, Kerry got 88% of the black vote in 2004. Other polls will show that Gore got 90% in 2000, Clinton got 84% in '96 and 83% in '92 (a historic low), Dukakis got 90% in '88, and Mondale got 90% in 84.
Meanwhile, in 2004, Al Sharpton couldn't crack 20% of the black vote in the South Carolina Democratic primary (32% of SC blacks voted for Kerry and 36% for Edwards).
Was this because all of these white candidates were "black enough," or are you going to just admit that you're a bit wrong (/racist) in accusing black voters of voting based on skin color instead of on issues?
Now, you may bristle at me accusing you of racism for pointing this out, but you are judging black people on a different standard from white people based on their skin color. Instead of looking at whether historically they as a group have supported certain issues (like evangelicals, union members, executives, or any other group with shared values), you accuse them of racism based on your own distorted perception of their values.
It's like how Colin Powell, a moderate Republican, endorsed Obama for a variety of reasons including being deeply troubled by the attacks on him for being Muslim (which he's not, but Powell asks, "So what if he was?") and by the pick of Sarah Palin as VP. Immediately, people like Rush Limbaugh dismissed the endorsement as being racially motivated.
What the heck? Lieberman, a white Senator who would've been the Democratic VP in 2000 but for a few votes and who would be a Democrat today if not for a vigorous primary challenge over the issue of the Iraq War endorsed the McCain-Palin ticket, and no one has accused him of doing so based on race. He did so based on some policy issues, breaking with his traditional political allies to do so, just like Colin Powell did.
So, why hasn't anyone accused him of being racist? Because he's white, and the people accusing black people of voting based on race hold black people to a different standard than they do white people. White people are assumed to vote based on substance. Black people are assumed to vote based on racial loyalty.
And that's racist. Facially racist -- judging people differently based on the color of their skin. It's disgusting, and it's a sign that the people making the accusations view the world through racially-tinged eyes of their own.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
what you're talking about is prediction, not correlation. So, correlation is a good starting point for determining causation. But it does not indicate the direction of causation, so you cannot interpret the relationship between those two variables with any sort of validity.
Hence, correlation!=causation, because the link between the two has not been established in any way, shape or form - only the fact that there is a link (which is the correlation).