Colleagues,

Based on the dialogue following my keynote address at the Savannah SRS
Conference in November, my understanding is that we are exploring the
appropriateness of the use of the terms, unpredictable and probabilistic.
Martha left us with unpredictable but some of us wonder what the meaning of that
term is for SUHB based research.

For example, does unpredictable permit the use of any inferential statistical
tests?

Would SUHB be best served by adopting a qualitatively oriented research approach
that would not require the use of any inferential statistics?

Jacqui

Jacqueline Fawcett


-----Original Message-----
From: kelly rutherford [mailto:kdrn@...]
Sent: Thu 12/11/2003 4:12 PM
To: Martha_E_Rogers@yahoogroups.com
Cc:
Subject: Re: [Martha_E_Rogers] Probabilistic v Unpredictability



OK, this backwoods brother will bite.

I tend to agree with Brother Bear's assessment about use of the term
unpredictable. The term does seem to have multi-conceptual use. As an excuse
to not "Scientifically" explore a pattern or phenomenon I would substitute the
concept of "Objectively Unmeasurable". When something cannot be reduced to a
number in an equation or a figure on a graph it is often deemed unworthy of
"Proper Scientific Research". I feel the key word in the last sentence is
"reduce", a concept among Unitary Scientist often considered "Sin" or "Fightin'
Words".

I'm not sure where this discussion began Bear, but it reminds me of defending
my Masters thesis against a panel of die hard, femanist, objective,
reductionists. Oops, my wife will kill me for that one, but it was a traumatic
experience. One lone, younger, male nurse practioner student against all those
old........ I digress. They are all respected friends and know how I like to
tease them about their horror when I presented a Unitary based position to my
arguments that none were prepared to discuss. I passed and survived well for
the experience. Back on topic. When arguments about statistical concepts
errupt we usually end up trying to defend the Unitary perspective. I took the
opposite approach and presented my position from the standpoint that they were
using the out-dated concepts of a paternalistic system that bases worth on
objective measurement with the admitted inability to measure significant
phenomena. Without being condescending I presented an integrated approach
that allowed acknowledgment of the unmeasurable and value to all pattern
manifestations, measureable and unmeasurable. A few of you may have seen my
model back in 1999? at convention.

So, I guess my question would be this. With this discussion are we defending
the Unitary position or exploring the use of statistical concept within the
SUHB?


Any takers?

GURU


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