Quantitude – Details, episodes & analysis

In this week’s episode, our 150th and the last of season 5, Greg and Patrick hear from five people at different stages of their academic journey, who share some of their concerns about a career in academia. Along the way we also mention: deathscrolling, Patrick’s fuzzy blanket, slow motion ballerina, Twix, academia infomercial, Twitter admins, micromanaging, pilot training, young Turks at the gate, stupid shit like this, chalk holders, administrative tennis, Nietzsche, Eeyore, Kaitlin Clark assists, blizzard of information, kick the can, when the street lights come on, and water goggles.

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In this week's episode Patrick and Greg somehow manage to tie together pretending to be sick with game shows with zombies with conspiracy boards to explore the remarkable inter-relations among probability distributions, starting with the Bernoulli and biting their way through the binomial, z, t, chi-square, F, and beyond. Along the way they also discuss having a 122 degree temperature, playing with mercury, daytime TV, Paul Lynde, Vanna White, horses and plows, breeding like cats, the long con, the Swiss vs. the French, Zombieland, the Quincunx, fifth grade math, Lowly Worm, a lazy S, the double tap, and choosing free will. 

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In this week's episode Greg and Patrick take a walk down memory lane to rediscover classical test theory,  although they revisit this through the lens of modern latent variable models. They describe how these classical methods are actually highly restricted latent measurement models and they explore how these restrictions can be relaxed and even tested. Along the way they also discuss weird dates, free Tupperware, yellow fatty beans, advice cookies, in bed, scalloped tiles, scales at NASA, important footnotes, working in your garden, being buck naked, Dark Side of the Moon, squarshing, deserving variance, and when the cops show up.

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In this episode Patrick and Greg explore the many faces of ethics in quantitative research, particularly as related to issues that arise in the day-to-day analytical decisions we make. In that spirit, Quantitude has an ethical obligation to warn listeners that they also discuss speedometers, rushing and dragging, shoplifting, calling me Shirley, asteroids vs. pinball, apple pie, Beneficence and Non-malefeasance playing tonight at the cat's cradle, forgetting things are illegal, stringing barbed wire, dotting T's and crossing I's, and horse fighting. 

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Greg and Patrick discuss issues of controlling for extraneous variables, by randomization and by design, but especially the challenges and assumptions associated with statistical control. Along the way they also mention drag racing, Volkswagen Bugs, Seabiscuit, Harrison Bergeron, Diet Coke, Janet Jackson, John Denver, gastrointestinal distress, Sewall Wright, and babies and bathwater. 

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In this episode Patrick & Greg consider in what ways they have become their parents and then attempt to use that insight to better understand how one can provide a quantitative review of a substantive manuscript without becoming the much reviled Reviewer 2. Along the way they also discuss Ginsu knives, not wearing pants, Ouija boards, using "and" in place of "but", five-finger death punches, the kraken, happy feet, mad libs, everyone needing a Longstreet, book vs. movie endings, and dumpster diving. 

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Greg and Patrick discuss Patrick's potentially horrible idea for post-publication review, in which a journal is created for the sole purpose of reviewing the soundness of the quantitative methods used in papers that have already been published in flagship journals. Hair-brained scheme, or sheer genius? You be the judge. Along the way they also mention driving without headlights, homemade explosives, modified wheelchairs, the IJCC, guacamole at Margaret's Cantina, dishwashers and JetDry, the IAD, blind pigs and acorns, the 15 commandments, and Jamaican bobsleds. 

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Today Patrick & Greg step off-camera and pull in Dr. Samantha Anderson who is a quantitative psychologist at Arizona State University and is an expert in all things related to the so-called “replication crisis.” They are uncharacteristically quiet as she talks about the past, present, and future of replication in the social sciences. Along the way they also discuss: Ask Sammy, bioluminescence, cheat day, podcast pre-registration, music that makes you younger, Defcon 5, or maybe 1, or 3, mother-in-laws, air quotes, and the queen of the world. 

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Greg and Patrick talk about the control of Type I error rate. Well, more like... they say stuff, change their minds, say stuff, change their minds... and in the end — spoiler alert — reach no unified conclusion whatsoever.  But they do manage to hit a number of the relevant issues around Type I error control, albeit largely accidentally and inconsistently. Along the way, they also mention porch witches, furries, cereal killers, neuralizers, why some TAs deserve hazard pay, lawyering-up, rocking chairs in unison,  how Patrick controls the pet population, all things Scottish, and yellow lights. 

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Patrick and Greg hold a traditional Irish funeral for multivariate analysis of variance, starting with a heartfelt eulogy in front of family and friends in the church and then moving to a more honest reckoning with Mom and Aunt Dotty at the reception in the school gym following the service. Along with a celebration of a life questionably well lived, they also discuss Ned Devine, mildly inebriated priests, champagne supernovas, the four British actors, eugoogalies, leeches, cowardice, senescence, legal disclaimers, bringing out your dead, and Danny Boy. 

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