A very rough guess is better than nothing, especially when the stakes are high.
No, a rough guess that’s wrong can give people unwarrented confidence that they think they know something when they know nothing.
At the very least you should at confidence intervals. That way you discover that you know nothing.
Correct. That is why all serious treatments of the Drake Equation give low and high estimates for every factor, and low and high results from those estimates. The same could be done with the equation I’m proposing.
No, a rough guess that’s wrong can give people unwarrented confidence that they think they know something when they know nothing.
At the very least you should at confidence intervals. That way you discover that you know nothing.
Correct. That is why all serious treatments of the Drake Equation give low and high estimates for every factor, and low and high results from those estimates. The same could be done with the equation I’m proposing.