This is just lovely!
" * Hypothesis: the loss of my socks is due to alien burglary.
* Null Hypothesis: the loss of my socks is nothing to do with alien burglary.
* Alternate Hypothesis: the loss of my socks is due to alien burglary.
In order to test whether your hypothesis is true or not, you have to carry out some research to see if you can back it up. So you set up a hi-tech alien detection system and record whether times of alien activity are correlated with when your socks go missing.
However, when you get your results, it鈥檚 possible that any relationship that appears in your data was produced by random chance. In order to back up your hypothesis you need to compare the results against the opposite situation: that the loss of socks is not due to alien burglary. This is your null hypothesis 鈥?the assertion that the things you were testing (i.e. rates of alien activity and sock loss) are not related and your results are the product of random chance events.
The next step is to compare these two alternatives using the magic of鈥?(cue dramatic music)鈥?statistics.
In statistics, the only way of supporting your hypothesis is to refute the null hypothesis. Rather than trying to prove your idea (the alternate hypothesis) right you must show that the null hypothesis is likely to be wrong 鈥?you have to 鈥榬efute鈥?or 鈥榥ullify鈥?the null hypothesis. Unfortunately you have to assume that your alternate hypothesis is wrong until you find evidence to the contrary. So it鈥檚 innocent until proven guilty for the aliens."
Have a look at:
http://www.null-hypothesis.co.uk/science鈥?/a>
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment