Tuesday, June 27, 2006
Post the Eighth
Wherein your Host Witnesses His First Methods Debate
The quantitative methods field is rife with debate and since I am a (lightly-salted) peanut in the Land of Elephants, I have decided to keep a low profile when discussions of preferred methods or software come up.
Personally your host is of opinion that various techniques we learn are like tools in a tool-box. Just as one wouldn’t use a chainsaw to hang a picture on the wall, there are situations when we might prefer OLS to MLE to Bayesian analysis. I would further say that canned statistical software is probably appropriate for most researchers. The extra effort required to learn R is wasted when STATA does 90% of what we need and add-ons like Zelig or R-Commander are available for free.
Your host has been told that publicly admitting to these opinions would cause me to be labeled a methods “goober.”
So I keep quiet and observe. It is interesting to hear dismissive snorts about how such-and-such is a “frequentist” or so-and-so “STILL uses STATA.” But today I witnessed my first bona-fide methods skirmish, however brief, between two methods elephants.
Elephant 1 made the simple statement that OLS should be the preferred method for analysis if a thorough pre and post-regression analysis has been conducted and more complicated models have confirmed the results. In your host’s opinion, this is a rather non-controversial statement since OLS is easiest mode of analysis for the reader (and writer) to interpret and this was precisely Elephant 1’s point.
He was immediately challenged by Elephant 2, apparently a breed of the Bayesian pacaderm family, who preferred a method with “no assumptions.” (This peanut didn’t want to ask about priors.) Elephant 1 was too kind in response (he is Canadian-bred) and simply re-iterated his point that, if other methods confirm the results, OLS was a reliable and time-tested approach. Elephant 2 stormed away muttering “garbage” – since it was, afterall, Elephant 1’s class. Why Elephant 2 was in the class, I will never know…
And so, gentle reader, if you ever want to go to Math Camp, you have two options: be a methods chauvinist or be quiet. Some might be lucky enough to be born Canadian and, hence, able to express reasonable opinions but the rest of us have to choose.
The quantitative methods field is rife with debate and since I am a (lightly-salted) peanut in the Land of Elephants, I have decided to keep a low profile when discussions of preferred methods or software come up.
Personally your host is of opinion that various techniques we learn are like tools in a tool-box. Just as one wouldn’t use a chainsaw to hang a picture on the wall, there are situations when we might prefer OLS to MLE to Bayesian analysis. I would further say that canned statistical software is probably appropriate for most researchers. The extra effort required to learn R is wasted when STATA does 90% of what we need and add-ons like Zelig or R-Commander are available for free.
Your host has been told that publicly admitting to these opinions would cause me to be labeled a methods “goober.”
So I keep quiet and observe. It is interesting to hear dismissive snorts about how such-and-such is a “frequentist” or so-and-so “STILL uses STATA.” But today I witnessed my first bona-fide methods skirmish, however brief, between two methods elephants.
Elephant 1 made the simple statement that OLS should be the preferred method for analysis if a thorough pre and post-regression analysis has been conducted and more complicated models have confirmed the results. In your host’s opinion, this is a rather non-controversial statement since OLS is easiest mode of analysis for the reader (and writer) to interpret and this was precisely Elephant 1’s point.
He was immediately challenged by Elephant 2, apparently a breed of the Bayesian pacaderm family, who preferred a method with “no assumptions.” (This peanut didn’t want to ask about priors.) Elephant 1 was too kind in response (he is Canadian-bred) and simply re-iterated his point that, if other methods confirm the results, OLS was a reliable and time-tested approach. Elephant 2 stormed away muttering “garbage” – since it was, afterall, Elephant 1’s class. Why Elephant 2 was in the class, I will never know…
And so, gentle reader, if you ever want to go to Math Camp, you have two options: be a methods chauvinist or be quiet. Some might be lucky enough to be born Canadian and, hence, able to express reasonable opinions but the rest of us have to choose.
Labels: ICPSR
