Wraith

Thanks for helping to prove my point. Green Bay had only two TD drives against Minnesota, one was only 22 yards after Brad Johnson fumbled and the other on a 82 yard pass on the third play of the drive. Clearly, Minnesota did not force Favre to drive the length of the field and they lost.

In case you missed it, Losman was 3 for 3 on third downs during our only lengthy drive which included a 24 yard pass on 3 and 13. Losman then only passed on three more third downs the entire game, completing a 24 yard pass to Evans on 3 and 6 and taking a 6 yard sack once. Seems like maybe the should have tried a few more passes on third down to me.

Absolutely not, it was because Brett Favre has proven that when you force him to drive the length of the field and string together 12 - 14 plays he will often make a mistake and turn the ball over.

You are an idiot. A huge, freakin' idiot. Every week you come in here spewing your nonsense. It's so funny, because you come in like a blathering idiot spewing the same incorrect nonsense that you miss things that could actually be criticized. Let me spell something out for you because you apparently have your head in the sand. Every week teams come in against the Colts and try to win in a shoot out, and every week they lose. The only teams that have come close to winning are the teams that play ball control, running football, such as the Bills and the Titans. No turnovers, a good running game, and forcing turnovers. Keep the Colts offense OFF THE FIELD AT ALL COSTS. The Bills limited the Colts to 17 points at home in their cushy little dome despite letting Manning pick them apart in large part because the offense, including Losman, played conservative, ball control offense. But I don't expect someone as stupid as you to notice such things, as you have proved time and again that depth of thought and subtlety are not things you are capable of.

Sure he avoided a sack. Freeney came untouched from the blindside early in the game and Losman stepped up into the pocket, shook Freeney loose, and got sacked by McFarland.

Couple of points: - "Regardless of measurement error?" This particular behavior only happens when there is measurement error. - He definitely took a long time to explain his hypothesis in detail but this thread would not have degenerated as it did without the presence of certain other members of this board, who have also let their arguements evolve over time.

Yep, that one was indeed a poor choice of words.

Of course I did. I then asked Holcomb's Arm to clarify his position. He responded to me quickly and publicly: "Perhaps I need to be more specific about what my hypothesis actually is. (Although it's not really "my" hypothesis since I read about it elsewhere.) Someone who gets an extremely high score on an I.Q. test is likely to get a somewhat lower score if that person is retested. Someone who gets a very low score on an I.Q. test is likely to get a slightly higher score if retested. This phenomenon would vanish if there was no measurement error on either of the tests." - HA.

Because I have displaced this rubberband, it will now snap back. Absolutely true. Of course elasticity is the cause. In that quote at least, he is not saying the CAUSE is measurement error. He is correct in implying that without measurement error, the regression towards the mean would not happen (for the obvious reason that without measurement error there would be no deviation from the mean in the first place). Semantics again.

I am not trying to criticize you here because you have already recognized some of the flaws in your study (small sample size, for example). However, you results do not really seem to prove what you think it indicates. Your numbers are showing how long the QBs hold the ball, not how much time they have. That is interesting because you would have no idea how much time Manning, Brady, and Losman would have had if they had not chosen to throw the ball. Your numbers, while clearly not enough to prove anything, tend to show that Losman holds the ball for less time than Manning (2.9 to 3.0 sec) and only slightly more than Brady (2.9 to 2.6 sec). In addition, on plays where you indicate pressure, Losman had 3.13 seconds while Manning had 3.55 seconds until pressure. Brady apparently felt no pressure. While none of this is anywhere near conclusive, I don't think the data reflects negatively on Losman at all.

I've already seen BJ argue, incorrectly, that the behavior HA describes does not exist. It does. I have then seen that same person, BJ, as well as yourself and few others, argue that the phenonemon is caused by the normal distribution of the population and the error. I have also seen that same group argue that HA is arguing that measurement error is causing the behavior to happen. That group has also argued that HA is arguing that measurement error is causing a regression towards the mean. I have seen HA say that measurement error is necessary for this event to happen. I have not seen HA say that measurement error is causing a regression towards the mean. Please show me where HA supposedly made this claim that measurement error causes regression towards the mean. Also, keep in mind that at least one of the published scientists/statisticians has already made an incorrect claim in this thread. So if HA did make the claim, admit that it happens and move on as it is clearly not pertinent to HA's stated hypothesis or the current argument. Most of you are arguing over semantics.

I may have missed it when he explicitely stated that measurement error is causing the regression towards the mean, but that doesn't seem to be what the argument is about here at all anymore. I do not think anyone would argue that the phenomenon HA is describing does not happen. It seems to be that you are arguing about what the cause of that phenomenon is. Fair enough: Without measurement error, this phenomenon could not occur. That is because without measurement error, there would be no deviation from the true results. So if HA is saying that measurement error is needed for this phenomenon to occur, he would in fact be correct. However, while measurement error is necessary (because it causes the necessary deviation) the regression towards mean is really happening because the sample population (the range of "true" values) and the error are normally distributed, which is what Bungee Jumper is arguing. This is also true. I have not seen HA say that the normal distribution is NOT causing the regression. His example he just laid out in a response to me shows he understands how the normal distribution is causing the phenomenon. So are we really just arguing over semantics? EDIT: I liken it to someone saying that stretching a rubber band is causing it to snap back to it's original form. Yes, the displacement needs to occur for the snap back to occur, but the snap back is actually occuring because of the elasticity of the rubber band. Both are necessary. It seems to me to be, at least right now, an argument of semantics.

If he was ever arguing that, he doesn't appear to be now.

So what exactly are you arguing for/against in this entire debate? What you've said is true, but not because measurement error is causing regression towards the mean but because both sample population and measurement error are normally distributed. What is the conflict about?

We are arguing the same side here, but allow me a slight nitpick. I would very much argue against height being a discrete value. Length in any form (such as height of person) is pretty much as continuous a phenomenon as one could find. An incapable measurement system could make continuous data seem discrete, but it certainly would not make it discrete. It's the so-called "chunky data" effect.

HA, I'm having a hard time getting past the fact that you claim measuring height has no measurement error. Every measurement system has measurement error, most especially ones that involve human judgement such as measuring height in the manner you describe. Measuring capability takes different forms. You talk about measurement error in this thread in reference to a system reporting the "true" value. However, for a measurement system to be capable, it must also be able to tell the difference between two samples that are known to be different. In your example measurement system, what happens when I am 6' 2 5/8ths" while you are 6' 2 3/8ths". Your measurement system would report us both as 6' 2", which while somewhat "true" (we would both be 6' 2" something) is not valuable because a reasonable measurement system would notice the distincition. This is a long way of saying that in your example, you are hiding the measurement error by using an inappropriate and incapable measurement system. The fact that you've used that in an example makes me wonder about your true understanding of what measurement error is.

No, that's not an opportunity. They had two opportunities to score (1 fumble, 1 interception) and they scored on one. 50%. The offense never touched the ball on the other interception and took a knee with 14 seconds left in the half on their own 6 yard line. I would not count either of those as opportunities and I doubt any reasonable person could.

What is exactly is your point? The offense scored on 50% of their opportunities...

You are making your arguments overly complicated. I agree completely that the methodology is shaky. However, you do not even need to look that closely to understand his conclusion is wrong: He is trying to say that by retaking the test, he is showing that error is causing a regression towards the mean. However, by retaking the test, you are mitigating the effects of measurement error. If his methodology truely showed a regression towards the mean, he would be helping to prove the opposite hypothesis of his own. It's simple.

On 54 attempts. Nice.

What does this have to do with Rupert Murdoch's stated intent to create a conservative news outlet?

This paragraph tells us all we need to know about your "intelligence."

No, I'm not surprised, you pretty much repeated what I wrote in my post. I'm just curious why you'd prefer a party that claims to support an issue you care about (limited government), ignores that issue, and then instead wastes enormous amount of time, money, and political capital on issues you are either against or ambivalent to.

So you prefer a government that "pays lip service" to issues that are important to you and then instead focuses on issues that you either do not care about or are against (the religious topics, for example: stem cell research, gay marriage, and abortion)?

Alright, so if you are neither a Republican nor a Democrat, what argument are you trying to make with this thread? Isn't this a lateral move in your mind? Or is it that you think the Republicans were the lesser of two evils in this election as well?