The Economist posted an article this week titled “The trial of Lucy Letby has shocked British statisticians“. Great read. My take on the article is not that statistics may have been poorly performed in the setting of a murder trial while also stating that statistics are poorly understood in general.
In the United States, science in general and statistics in specific are poorly understood — including by scientists and physicians! Yet, understanding of BASIC statistics would help everyone in their daily lives. Think about how understanding basic statistical significance would affect how Americans understand basic economic principles, gambling, health outcomes, banking and investment, and parsing out unbelievable political statement by both of our main political parties.
C.P. Snow (1905-1980) had the wonderful “The Two Cultures and the Scientific Revolution” (A Rede Lecture) published in 1959. What a read and I highly recommend it! At that time, he believed those in the liberal arts were going to be consumed by those in the sciences. I think his prediction came true as those in the liberal arts and fine arts now basically can only advance academically with peer-reviewed papers, grants, etc. That complaint is for another essay… Regardless, he states clearly:
“But I believe the pole of total incomprehension of science radiates its influence on all the rest. That total incompre- hension gives, much more pervasively than we realise, living in it, an unscientific flavour to the whole traditional’ culture, and that unscientific flavour is often, much more than we admit, on the point of turning anti-scientific. The feelings of one pole become the anti-feelings of the other. If the scientists have the future in their bones, then the traditional culture responds by wishing the future did not exist. It is the traditional culture, to an extent remarkably little diminished by the emergence of the scientific one, which manages the western world.“
I don’t like the term “western world” as I think the fight between how we think concretely and how we feel emotionally / how we do math and how we read literature / how we think objectively and how we think subjectively leads to anti-intellectualism and leads to further problems such as racism, denial of climate change, the anti-vax movement, etc.
How do such concepts fit into religion? At least in my strain of faith (Christianity), the understanding of basic science principles among many church members and leaders is bereft of simple, basic knowledge. There is so much to write about this issue, but I would recommend this wonderful essay by Andy Crouch in BioLogos and a small essay I wrote about this issue in God and Nature Magazine.
One theological point to move to here…. My book, “A Theology of the Microbiome” (SacraSage Press) is in full publication mode. I am hoping it is out soon, soon, soon. Endorsements are done. Final editing is done. The cover looks great. I do spend some time in the book talking about God being basically a statistical being since statistics appears to be a significant part of reality. Mind you, my writing is theological here as the concept of God is unprovable and the concept of no God is unprovable.
Thus, a statistical God (the “Uber-statistician”) could predict accurately but not exactly or deterministically all future events. This concept makes sense in the setting of Naturalismppp, including ideas contained in panentheism and prehension (see prior posts). In my upcoming book, I state:
“God does not ‘know’ or ‘choose to know’ the location of every
quark, atom, molecule, and creature. Instead, God has just enough knowledge
through God’s self, which one would identify as ultimate statistical
knowledge (thus, the ‘Uber-Statistician’)…Since God has predictive power but no foreknowledge, determinism goes away…God’s lack of foreknowledge, as described by open and relational theology, would allow each individual entity to have freedom of outcomes. God may come close to all knowing, but God will never completely know outcomes. The Uber-Statistician is compatible with non-deterministic
creativity in nature even in its simplest elements as can be seen with statistics
being used to predict the distribution probability of a particle in the setting of wave-particle duality.”
Indeed, lots of ideas here regarding free will, determinancy, limited free will, theodicy, etc. Want to learn more? Put an order in for my book. ; )
If I go back to The Economist article, how much more helpful would it be for clergy to get some training (and I mean even the absolute minimal training) about statistics in high school, college or seminary? I think it would change the ways many “doctrinal” ideas in Christian denominations would be considered. Am I flaunting controversy? No. I am being a realist, especially when dealing with the triumphs and tragedies of every human on our planet (not counting the triumphs and tragedies of every creature on Earth — and including our home, tiny planet).
BTW: Great resource on world statistics here from the University of Arizona.
Johnny Cash (one of my favorites) singing “Give me that old time religion” here (no mention of statistics, sadly).
image made my Meta AI
Phi-The-Sci: Equilateral Musings 