I’m curious about the effectiveness of my post’s central gimmick. I invite anyone who’s read the post and hasn’t looked at any of the data linked at the end of it to take this poll.
In each pair of opposing claims, which claim do you find more likely?
[Edit: LW’s posting interface stripped out the “start=‘7’” attribute in the second half of my post’s list, so it’s re-numbered claims 7 to 12 as claims 1 to 6. Pretend the second half of the list starts at 7.]
Claims 1 & 7: harms and benefits from scientific research. [pollid:770]
One thing worth noting is that it’s possible for most people to get these answers right even if your gimmick worked—you’ve given them a chance to stop and think about it.
On the other hand, several of the statements did trip my BS filter, and even if I were to be wrong about which ones were false, they still didn’t have the plausibility you were expecting.
On the third hand, you’d probably be much better at fooling people if you said “surprisingly enough, ” instead of “it’s obvious that...”. I can totally believe that there are some things that still seem counter-intuitive to me, but its a harder sell to tell me that I’m wrong about something that is so obvious that you genuinely cannot see why I might think the opposite.
By “too close to choose”, do you mean that I can’t decide which I think is more likely, or I think that I don’t think there’s a statistically strong trend?
For some reason I’m shown the result and not given a chance to vote even though I haven’t voted on these polls before, but 1⁄7 I don’t know, 2⁄8 probably the latter, 3⁄9 the latter (V’q thrff crbcyr jub bccbfr nobegvba unir zber puvyqera, naq bccbfvgvba gb nobegvba vf urevgnoyr), 4⁄10 the former, 5⁄11 the former, 6⁄12 I’m surprised the split is that big; I’d guess the former, though.
Hmm...I did edit the comment after I submitted the post, when I noticed the HTML list issue, but I doubt that’s the cause since other users have been able to vote. (And I don’t remember editing any of the poll syntax.) Not sure what’s going on there.
I eventually managed to vote because I had Recent Comments open in another tab, where the poll was still vote-able. Maybe the software doesn’t allow the same user to have the same poll open in two different tabs at the same time? But that would allow people to see the results before voting...
Oops, I didn’t actually read 7 and assumed it was public opinion had grown more positive. Given the two choices actually presented, I’d say 7 more likely.
Edit: Relative credences (not necessarily probabilities since I’m conditioning on there being significant effect sizes), generated naively trying not to worry too much about second-guessing how you distributed intuitive and counterintuitive results:
I considered asking for people’s credence in each claim with probability polls, but reckoned that’d discourage responses, due to the extra effort needed to ensure coherence. (With 1 vs. 7, for instance, one would also have to think about the probability that neither claim’s true.)
When distributing the pairs across the lists, I had R flip six virtual coins to decide whether to swap the places of each pair after I’d written them. So it should be nice & random, making second guessing unnecessary...although I guess no one else can be 100% sure I’m telling the truth here!
With 12 votes in so far, and ignoring “too close” and taking the majority vote on 1st group/2nd group of statements, the LW community is 3 for 6. (I’m glossing over a trick question here, but, whatever.) So I guess we are quite ignorant of public opinion. Especially me.
I’m curious about the effectiveness of my post’s central gimmick. I invite anyone who’s read the post and hasn’t looked at any of the data linked at the end of it to take this poll.
In each pair of opposing claims, which claim do you find more likely?
[Edit: LW’s posting interface stripped out the “start=‘7’” attribute in the second half of my post’s list, so it’s re-numbered claims 7 to 12 as claims 1 to 6. Pretend the second half of the list starts at 7.]
Claims 1 & 7: harms and benefits from scientific research. [pollid:770]
Claims 2 & 8: adult Republican/Democrat (non-)identification. [pollid:771]
Claims 3 & 9: young vs. middle-aged adults on abortion. [pollid:772]
Claims 4 & 10: young vs. middle-aged on the Vietnam War. [pollid:773]
Claims 5 & 11: young vs. old on Vietnam War protesters. [pollid:774]
Claims 6 & 12: smokers’ (non-)regret. [pollid:775]
Into which kind of culture are you most assimilated?
[pollid:776]
One thing worth noting is that it’s possible for most people to get these answers right even if your gimmick worked—you’ve given them a chance to stop and think about it.
On the other hand, several of the statements did trip my BS filter, and even if I were to be wrong about which ones were false, they still didn’t have the plausibility you were expecting.
On the third hand, you’d probably be much better at fooling people if you said “surprisingly enough, ” instead of “it’s obvious that...”. I can totally believe that there are some things that still seem counter-intuitive to me, but its a harder sell to tell me that I’m wrong about something that is so obvious that you genuinely cannot see why I might think the opposite.
By “too close to choose”, do you mean that I can’t decide which I think is more likely, or I think that I don’t think there’s a statistically strong trend?
The former.
For some reason I’m shown the result and not given a chance to vote even though I haven’t voted on these polls before, but 1⁄7 I don’t know, 2⁄8 probably the latter, 3⁄9 the latter (V’q thrff crbcyr jub bccbfr nobegvba unir zber puvyqera, naq bccbfvgvba gb nobegvba vf urevgnoyr), 4⁄10 the former, 5⁄11 the former, 6⁄12 I’m surprised the split is that big; I’d guess the former, though.
Aaaaand the only ones I got wrong where those about the Vietnam War. Not bad for someone who’s never been in the US!
Hmm...I did edit the comment after I submitted the post, when I noticed the HTML list issue, but I doubt that’s the cause since other users have been able to vote. (And I don’t remember editing any of the poll syntax.) Not sure what’s going on there.
I eventually managed to vote because I had Recent Comments open in another tab, where the poll was still vote-able. Maybe the software doesn’t allow the same user to have the same poll open in two different tabs at the same time? But that would allow people to see the results before voting...
I also see results only. One tab, just opened this post for the first time.
Hfvat n pbqr orpnhfr lbh pbhyq cebonoyl gryy juvpu vf juvpu rira jura ebg13′q: “E” sbe evtug, “J” sbe jebat:
1-7 J
2-8 J
3-9 J
4-10 J
5-11 J
6-12 E
V qba’g xabj rknpgyl ubj onqyl guvf ersyrpgf ba zr fvapr cerfhznoyl gurfr dhrfgvbaf jrer cvpxrq sbe orvat pbhagrevaghvgvir, ohg vg’f cerggl pyrne V’z abg jryy-pnyvoengrq fvapr V jnf ernfbanoyl pbasvqrag va nyy bs gurz rkprcg gur svefg.
Oops, I didn’t actually read 7 and assumed it was public opinion had grown more positive. Given the two choices actually presented, I’d say 7 more likely.
Edit: Relative credences (not necessarily probabilities since I’m conditioning on there being significant effect sizes), generated naively trying not to worry too much about second-guessing how you distributed intuitive and counterintuitive results:
1:07 : 33:67
2:08 : 33:67
3:09 : 67:33
4:10 : 40:60
5:11 : 45:55
6:12 : 85:15
(Couple of side notes inspired by your edit.)
I considered asking for people’s credence in each claim with probability polls, but reckoned that’d discourage responses, due to the extra effort needed to ensure coherence. (With 1 vs. 7, for instance, one would also have to think about the probability that neither claim’s true.)
When distributing the pairs across the lists, I had R flip six virtual coins to decide whether to swap the places of each pair after I’d written them. So it should be nice & random, making second guessing unnecessary...although I guess no one else can be 100% sure I’m telling the truth here!
With 12 votes in so far, and ignoring “too close” and taking the majority vote on 1st group/2nd group of statements, the LW community is 3 for 6. (I’m glossing over a trick question here, but, whatever.) So I guess we are quite ignorant of public opinion. Especially me.