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Be good-argument-driven, not data-driven

twitchard.github.io

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Re: Be good-argument-driven, not data-driven

#101

Post by bell-cot »

robertlagrant wrote: post #90
bell-cot wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, your reality-driven approach has ~zero emotional appeal for most managers, exec's, and alpha-data-scientist wanna-be's.

Data has CYA appeal.

Needing to CYA also has pretty low emotional appeal for managers, exec's, and alpha-data-scientist wanna-be's. (Until it's just about too late, obviously.)

And recall Mark Twain's old quip about lies & statistics. The more & bigger data that the folks who control the data & analysis have, the easier it is to make sure that those meet their own emotional & political needs.

Re: Be good-argument-driven, not data-driven

#102

Post by tshaddox »

crabmusket wrote: post #9

This reminds me a lot of the discussion of the scientific method by Karl Popper, and David Deutsch who was very influenced by Popper. "Being data-driven" sounds very empirical . Just look at the data, and see what you find in it. But you can't just let the data "speak for itself" without an explanation or a theory that interprets the data. Popper in Conjectures and Refutations : > Observation is always selective. It…

The fact that empiricism is false was a revelation to me as a young adult, after reading so much about the triumphs of science and reason and getting very excited (mistakenly) that you can get away without bothering with pesky things like epistemology. Of course, Quine and others pointed out that empirical observations are useless without explanations both of the phenomenon being measured and the measurement device itself (including, for example, the human vision system). And I believe it was Deutschmark who pointed out that empiricism is itself an epistemology which had to be invented. It turns out that it tended to be a significant improvement upon previous widespread epistemologies, but that doesn’t mean it’s not false. :)

Re: Be good-argument-driven, not data-driven

#103

Post by vitiral »

jasode wrote: post #16

To the author... I'd suggest a rewrite of what you're trying to communicate because your usage of "good-argument-driven" is a textbook example of Begging The Question: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Begging_the_question For discussion's sake, let's go along with excluding data/metrics/science in pushing for arguments. In this framework, what exactly is a "good" argument based on? Gut feel? Opinion? There was a famous…

This is a textbook example of The Strawman Argument.

I'm pretty sure the author is talking about "data" in the context of "databases", i.e. repositories of digital information that can be queried, transformed and displayed (dashboarded).

In other words the author is assuming the value of human's more natural data processing: common sense, personal experience and conversing with others (empathy).

If a process/feature/etc doesn't make sense within how you understand your product, then you can make an argument based on that. The argument will involve data (i.e. the current architecture) but not data in any database.

Re: Be good-argument-driven, not data-driven

#104

Post by atq2119 »

verisimi wrote: post #59
viridian wrote: post #46

This entire discussion makes a good case for why the general populace would benefit from being taught the basics of philosophy. In this case the topic of value is the often fraught relationship between empiricism and rationalism , and the impacts each have on the scientific process, research, education, and how we go about understanding the world. To operate with one with a complete absence of the other is to expose…

I agree so strongly with this. The point I would add is that hardly anyone uses the empirical process directly. It is all 'this article claims this' or 'this study says that'. It's very 'meta' with little to no personal verification or testing of the claims - ie, theories based on theories or models based on models, or maps based on maps. Very few check the terrain itself to confirm that the map applies. We trust edu…

In the metaverse, the map is the territory. Think about how the word "map" is used in gaming.

Re: Be good-argument-driven, not data-driven

#105

Post by strikelaserclaw »

germinalphrase wrote: post #68
bell-cot wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, your reality-driven approach has ~zero emotional appeal for most managers, exec's, and alpha-data-scientist wanna-be's.

Why? Inadequately “technical”?

Our field is filled with people who want to use the most technical approach possible to solve a non issue, their paychecks probably depend on it.

Re: Be good-argument-driven, not data-driven

#106

Post by dwaltrip »

kqr wrote: post #4

While I agree completely with the premise of this article, on the other hand I'm weighing the relatively robust findings by Meehl et al. They find, time and time again, in all sorts of fields, that extremely parsimonious models like equal-weighted linear regression of one or two predictors outperform expert judgment[1]. One would think this is cognitively dissonant enough, but it gets worse: This article, with the th…

> Edit a few minutes later: This actually prompted me to refresh on the subject. It might be the case that Meehl is actually making the same argument as this article, only it gets distorted when repeated. Some things are reliably measurable; for those things be data-driven. Other things not so much, then use your expertise.

Highlighting your edit at the bottom, as I think it’s important and not everyone will read that far.

Re: Be good-argument-driven, not data-driven

#107

Post by allsunny »

ajkjk wrote: post #40
allsunny wrote: post #37

I won’t belabor the point because others have already made it: this article assumes there is some way to sort through good and bad arguments in the absence of data - a pretty big leap. The reality is all of our arguments are appealing to some sort of data (eg previous experience), it’s just that it doesn’t always fit in a neat definition of data. Obligatory: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_models_are_wrong

"Previous experience" is not what is meant by 'data' in this industry. If company's decision-making was including both data and experience/wisdom/intuition, it wouldn't be so frustratingly wrong all the time.

I agree that's not what is meant by 'data' in the industry and I'm challenging that a little bit. However, even if we use the industry definition, what you're saying is hyperbole. Every company uses both data and experience to varying degrees. People get hung up when they think the balance isn't appropriate - not surprisingly, that happens when one or the other doesn't support their opinion. I'd rather be in a position of defending my opinion with data. It's already been quoted but... "If we have data, let's look at data. If all we have are opinions, let's go with mine."

Re: Be good-argument-driven, not data-driven

#108

Post by allsunny »

HPsquared wrote: post #48
allsunny wrote: post #37

I won’t belabor the point because others have already made it: this article assumes there is some way to sort through good and bad arguments in the absence of data - a pretty big leap. The reality is all of our arguments are appealing to some sort of data (eg previous experience), it’s just that it doesn’t always fit in a neat definition of data. Obligatory: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_models_are_wrong

There's lies, damn lies, and statistics. Models are further along, beyond statistics.

Models are just applied statistics?

Re: Be good-argument-driven, not data-driven

#109

Post by jasode »

vitiral wrote: post #103
jasode wrote: post #16

To the author... I'd suggest a rewrite of what you're trying to communicate because your usage of "good-argument-driven" is a textbook example of Begging The Question: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Begging_the_question For discussion's sake, let's go along with excluding data/metrics/science in pushing for arguments. In this framework, what exactly is a "good" argument based on? Gut feel? Opinion? There was a famous…

This is a textbook example of The Strawman Argument. I'm pretty sure the author is talking about "data" in the context of "databases", i.e. repositories of digital information that can be queried, transformed and displayed (dashboarded). In other words the author is assuming the value of human's more natural data processing: common sense, personal experience and conversing with others (empathy). If a process/feature/…

>I'm pretty sure the author is talking about "data" in the context of "databases",

Yes I agree and the "data metrics" was the interpretation I was commenting on. Instead of straw-man, I actually steel-manned what the author was trying to communicate in my other comment. (One has to read this thread's blog post combined with his previous blog entry to understand what the author means by "good argument".)

Re: Be good-argument-driven, not data-driven

#110

Post by cptcobalt »

I couldn't agree with this more. I feel like the author took some of the arguments straight from my brain—I'm exhausted by pseudoscientific "data-driven" arguments.

From my experience, most of these try to distill an incredibly complex problem space down to a one-dimensional black and white decision. But the real world doesn't work like that–it's full of grey area, and things we can't effectively measure. If you're trying to slice and dice data down to a happy one-dimensional decision point, you're often missing or ignoring important detail.

At work, I'm far more happy with postmortems with general, open "good/bad" lists of after the fact feedback, that we use to consider how we prioritize and design what comes next.

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