significance testing
by hurricanejessica
In statistics, as is my crude understanding, one prematurely makes an assumption which is thought to be valid until the data contradicts it. When a sample is taken from a larger data pool, for example, one would take the sample data and work backwards to see if it is truly indicative of the greater picture.
You, through a lifetime of personal data collection, have taken the small sample of your time with me and formed what seems to you to be a reasonable hypothesis:
Me ≠You
Any mathematician would warn you, dear, you are too quick to accept untested data as fact.
Without disregarding your knowledge of yourself, I am respectfully offering you a null hypothesis to ensure the accuracy of your assumption.
To test it, press your ear to the shell of me and see if you can hear the ocean.
Throw the possibility of us into the air to find out on which side it lands.
Brave the ant hills that line the wooden stairs in the back yard of your perception.
Allow yourself these little indulgences.
If I have learned anything from statistics, it is that what seems to be clear based on your knowledge of the data can be proven false.
Dear one, the sample you plucked in the beginning, that initial damning assumption that crushed me like a window closing on the sound of crickets, may not be accurate. Perhaps if you keep dipping your open mind like a ladle into the sweet data of our circumstance, eventually the right sample will ease its way in, and you will reject your original hypothesis in lieu of a greater understanding of me.
