Featured Articles
Abstract
This article describes our motivation behind the development of RESEARCHERS.ONE, our mission, and how the new platform will fulfull this mission. We also compare our approach with other recent reform initiatives such as post-publication peer review and open access publications.
Abstract
I discuss how the replication crisis is caused by a reliance on "academic" probabilities, and how it can be resolved by what I call the "Fundamental Principle of Probability".
Abstract
See homepage for book here.
Abstract
I introduce a formalization of probability which takes the concept of 'evidence' as primitive. In parallel to the intuitionistic conception of truth, in which 'proof' is primitive and an assertion A is judged to be true just in case there is a proof witnessing it, here 'evidence' is primitive and A is judged to be probable just in case there is evidence supporting it. I formalize this outlook by representing propositions as types in Martin-Lof type theory (MLTT) and defining a 'probability type' on top of the existing machinery of MLTT, whose inhabitants represent pieces of evidence in favor of a proposition. One upshot of this approach is the potential for a mathematical formalism which treats 'conjectures' as mathematical objects in their own right. Other intuitive properties of evidence occur as theorems in this formalism.
Abstract
Publication of scientific research all but requires a supporting statistical analysis, anointing statisticians the de facto gatekeepers of modern scientific discovery. While the potential of statistics for providing scientific insights is undeniable, there is a crisis in the scientific community due to poor statistical practice. Unfortunately, widespread calls to action have not been effective, in part because of statisticians' tendency to make statistics appear simple. We argue that statistics can meet the needs of science only by empowering scientists to make sound judgments that account for both the nuances of the application and the inherent complexity of fundamental effective statistical practice. In particular, we emphasize a set of statistical principles that scientists can adapt to their ever-expanding scope of problems.
Abstract
Exchangeable models for countable vertex-labeled graphs can- not replicate the large sample behaviors of sparsity and power law degree distribution observed in many network datasets. Out of this mathematical impossibility emerges the question of how network data can be modeled in a way that reflects known empirical behaviors and respects basic statistical principles. We address this question by observing that edges, not vertices, act as the statistical units in networks constructed from interaction data, making a theory of edge-labeled networks more natural for many applications. In this context we introduce the concept of edge exchangeability, which unlike its vertex exchangeable counterpart admits models for networks with sparse and/or power law structure. Our characterization of edge exchangeable networks gives rise to a class of nonparametric models, akin to graphon models in the vertex exchangeable setting. Within this class, we identify a tractable family of distributions with a clear interpretation and suitable theoretical properties, whose significance in estimation, prediction, and testing we demonstrate.