I would say that logic is actually more important than math
can you elaborate? :)
I kind’a sort’a thought learning data analysis would give me “magical powers” to glean insight from data....like I could just throw a bunch of data on a spreadsheet, run some formulas and functions, and voila...enlightenment. But there’s a LOT that goes into deciding things like what kind of data to use, what to exclude, *how* to process the data, how to *interpret* the data *and* the results, etc. The formulas and statistics is just a small part of the toolbox used in data analysis.
There’s a lot of planning, pre-planning, figuring out what you want to find out and how to get there from what you have...you have to use a lot of logic, critical thinking skills, things like that before you even start doing the math and statistics, and certainly *after* you do the math. Does that make sense?
basically you say that pretty much all rationality skills (Logic, knogledge of biases and heuristics, etc...) are needed or beneficial to know how not to make mistakes while handling the data—right?
Yep. I think the best lessons I’ve learned revolve around actually *trying* to second guess myself. I’d crunch some numbers, feeling confident that I did everything right, only to realize that my assumptions or logic or something *other* than the mechanics of number crunching was off or wrong.
I began going through some basics on khan academy, and plan to then learn statistics and probability there.
i think I’ll wait with learning data analysis at least until after that.
can you elaborate? :)
I kind’a sort’a thought learning data analysis would give me “magical powers” to glean insight from data....like I could just throw a bunch of data on a spreadsheet, run some formulas and functions, and voila...enlightenment. But there’s a LOT that goes into deciding things like what kind of data to use, what to exclude, *how* to process the data, how to *interpret* the data *and* the results, etc. The formulas and statistics is just a small part of the toolbox used in data analysis.
There’s a lot of planning, pre-planning, figuring out what you want to find out and how to get there from what you have...you have to use a lot of logic, critical thinking skills, things like that before you even start doing the math and statistics, and certainly *after* you do the math. Does that make sense?
Yup, thanks :)
basically you say that pretty much all rationality skills (Logic, knogledge of biases and heuristics, etc...) are needed or beneficial to know how not to make mistakes while handling the data—right?
Yep. I think the best lessons I’ve learned revolve around actually *trying* to second guess myself. I’d crunch some numbers, feeling confident that I did everything right, only to realize that my assumptions or logic or something *other* than the mechanics of number crunching was off or wrong.