Talk:2303: Error Types

Explain xkcd: It's 'cause you're dumb.
Revision as of 01:36, 8 May 2020 by 162.158.159.74 (talk) (Comment on Roman numerals IIII and VIIII. Robert Carnegie)
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As of the time of this post, the title text is "Type IIII error: Mistaking tally marks for Roman neumerals". Is "neumerals" a typo, or is there a joke in there that I'm missing? Cosmogoblin (talk) 22:52, 6 May 2020 (UTC)

Looks like a typo to me. Randall's patrons should have caught this for him!
ProphetZarquon (talk) 23:07, 6 May 2020 (UTC)
That particular mistake is actually just called a type error.
162.158.62.221 23:12, 6 May 2020 (UTC)
Or, surely, a Type-0. 162.158.159.82 01:09, 7 May 2020 (UTC)
I am Type-O and as a Type-O Negative, I'm VERY popular at the blood bank! (Universal Donor) 108.162.216.48 01:25, 7 May 2020 (UTC)
Actually, that's an over-simplification. Type-O-neg is only universal for whole blood donations, and only truly universal for whole blood if you are also CMV-negative. For plasma donations, Type-AB (both -pos and -neg) are universal donors. For platelets, only Type-AB-pos is universal donor. 162.158.74.81 16:11, 7 May 2020 (UTC)
I was hoping it could be bent to be a tribute to John von Neumann. 172.68.189.223 05:00, 7 May 2020 (UTC)
Looks like same type of typo he made at word "blag": [Intentional.] 172.69.54.189 08:04, 7 May 2020 (UTC)
Perhaps a reference to Neumes? 162.158.158.211 09:47, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

108.162.216.48 01:24, 7 May 2020 (UTC) The explanation builds on definitions of terms in statistics. That's fine, but there are also non-statistical usages, just for example whether someone has now (or had before) the COVID-19 virus. A false positive is a test result which incorrectly indicates that a particular condition or attribute is present, and a false negative is a test result which incorrectly indicates that a particular condition or attribute is absent. A particular test is useful when its incidence of Type I and II errors is low. Types III and IV in that context would be given by poorly designed tests which, even if they give correct results, do it for unsupportable reasons and are therefore unreliable for future results. Types V, VI, VII, and VIII are necessary fillers in the sequence, once you decide that calling The Rise of Skywalker a mistake has to be error type IX simply because it's the ninth film in the series. JohnB (talk) 00:54, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

I could convince myself that the errors are a reference to each Star Wars movie. Definitely a stretch but I'd believe it. 162.158.106.24 02:00, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

Surely an Error of the Third Kind is when an Alien gets lost and lands on Earth. Arachrah (talk) 11:28, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

Can we please stop categorizing every comic about scientific research and methods as COVID-19 related? This is getting quite silly.162.158.187.201 14:31, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

While some members of the public this year are hearing about false positive and false negative for the first time in connection with SARS-COV2 and swab testing, usually in some counterfactual argument that getting tested now increases the probability that you got infected last week or something - I don't see that coronavirus needs to be mentioned in an explanation of the comic, given that it's xkcd and science happens here all the time. If this script ran in Arlo & Janis then a justification like that would be required... although today (May 7th) they're discussing Pavlov's dogs... is there a web page that explains Arlo & Janis? Robert Carnegie [email protected] 162.158.158.225 01:26, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

I spent some time musing about whether the Skywalker saga could be taken as an exemplar of each of the types (e.g. the hypothesis for #1 is that Anakin Skywalker could bring balance to the Force, and the experiment was assigning him a tutor), but it's a stretch. I do like the idea that #9 is the epitome of errordom.16:07, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

I suspect that people who like Episode IX would disagree, but I haven't found evidence that they even exist, so I can't say for sure. GreatWyrmGold (talk) 22:02, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

I'm not sure where this would fit in, but a correct answer that is viewed by the experimenter as being incorrect because of a misunderstanding, so that he changes the recording of the measurement, resulting in an incorrect measurement that he view as correct. This happened in a college classroom exercise involving Reynolds numbers. Above a certain value of Reynold's number, laminar flow will change to turbulent flow. However, that number is not where the change occurs but where laminar flow becomes unstable. One student changed all the measurements to indicate that the flow changed to turbulent almost immediately. I wondered what could have sped up the transition, thinking of things like loud noises and vibrations affecting the apparatus. The student immediately and loudly yelled that he "hadn't changed the numbers", with the vehemence indicating that he had actually changed the numbers. One problem with analog meters was that some people staring at the meters actually thought that the needle moved when it actually hadn't. Digital meters with automatic logging tended to get rid of this problem. 17:17, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

Everyone knows that of all the Reynolds numbers, only two actually matter. Burt and Debbie. (You're gonna say Ryan as well, I suppose...) 162.158.159.82 00:12, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

Wikipedia on Roman Numerals says: at some early time the Romans started to use the shorter forms IV and IX. But originally their numbers included 4 as IIII and 9 as VIIII. I wasn't sure if the Roman Empire used IV and IX at all, and I still am not sure, but if the change came early, so called, then I guess so. I wonder if there's a particular issue of stone cracking if you try to carve IIII on it, or it takes longer. Robert Carnegie [email protected] 162.158.159.74 01:36, 8 May 2020 (UTC)