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> Bayesian inference assumes the observed data are fixed and aims to quantify the evidentiary support for all possible levels of treatment effectiveness based on the data at hand.

The problem with this approach is that we can only observe ONE level of treatment effectiveness, i.e., the level of treatment effectiveness that the treatment actually possesses. All other possible levels of effectiveness are entirely hypothetical. There's no data about all these other possible levels of effectiveness because they don't occur in reality. So the data cannot possibly tell you anything about how likely is the observed outcome, because the observed outcome is the only outcome that you observe. I

This criticism was made over 100 years ago, and Bayesians still don't have an answer. They just keep going as if nothing happened, but the reality is their methodology is utterly and fatally flawed.


> In Bayesian statistics, on the other hand, the parameter is not a point but a distribution.

To be more precise, in Bayesian statistics a parameter is random variable. But what does that mean? A parameter is a characteristic of a population (as opposed to a characteristic of a sample, which is called a statistic). A quantity, such as the average cars per household right now. That's a parameter. To think of a parameter as a random variable is like regarding reality as just one realisation of an infinite number of alternate realities that could have been. The problem is we only observe our reality. All the data samples that we can ever study come from this reality. As a result, it's impossible to infer anything about the probability distribution of the parameter. The whole Bayesian approach to statistical inference is nonsensical.


Retained earnings are not taxed per se. A company pays taxes on profits. Whether the profits are distributed to shareholders or retained makes no difference whatsoever as far as taxes are concerned.


They are taxed; they are taxed because they are a subset of profits, which is a taxed category. They are not taxed more than other profits, but that doesn’t mean they’re ’not taxed’.


they are not

retained earnings by definition are the accumulation of net incomes, and net income by definition is post tax

what went into the produce the retained earnings (profit) has been taxed

but the retained earnings themselves are not subject to additional taxation (with a few exceptions)


How does exactly "breaking windows" improve the lives of people?


By creating work that needs to be done, and thus forcing people to start spending.


To bring things back to the original point, there's always a way for health centers to spend money improving patient care. They could hire more nurses and give the existing ones more sleep, for example. In the context of the analogy, a broken window is diverting resources from the broken plumbing and refrigerator motor instead of creating an incentive to spend where none existed.


I can't imagine a situation in which I'd want to explain what I want to do on the command line to an LLM, instead of typing the commands myself.


Use ffmpeg to extract the audio from the first ten seconds of an mp4 file and save it as mp3.


I wish the scroll bar was a little less invisible.


As expected. This is why we don't use nominal dollars for measuring changes in prices over long time periods. It's meaningless.


Assets like gold are also reaching new highs in real terms, which is giving people reason to be skeptical of the adjustments made for inflation.

But really none of it is as objective as it tries to pretend to be.


I think it's just a meaningless sentence.


Why would a stablecoin granting yield keep the banking system from working?


The theory, at least, is that everyone would eventually be incentivized to move deposits out of the banking system and into this.

(I am not sufficiently expert here to comment on the odds of an outcome like that)


Considering that stablecoins don't pay interest to the holder, I don't know why anyone would be incentivised to move their funds into stablecoins.


USDC gets me 4% on Coinbase, and USDB and other Bridge-issued custom stablecoins also give the customer rewards that they can pass onto the holder (thanks to MMF/similar cash equivalents behind the scenes etc).

But yes - this is why banks want to prevent stablecoin issuers from being allowed to grant rewards


If I deposit dollars in a savings account I will get paid interest, but that is different from the dollar itself being an interest-bearing asset. I think the same thing applies to stablecoins. Does USDC pay interest to the holder or do I have to make a USDC deposit at Coinbase in order to get paid interest? Also, banks already offer a ton of products that generate yield. I don't see why a product that seems relatively similar to many products that banks already offer would destroy their business... unless such a product is much better than what banks offer, but that doesn't seem to be the case.


>unless such a product is much better than what banks offer, but that doesn't seem to be the case.

I think you're basically correct here. I think the fear of the banks - and why they are insistent on prohibiting stablecoins from generating yield/interest (via the GENIUS act) - is that that doesn't stay true in the long-term, as stablecoins ascend as a cross-border payment/storage rail.

>Does USDC pay interest to the holder or do I have to make a USDC deposit at Coinbase in order to get paid interest?

I believe USDC from Coinbase is framed as "reward", and is downstream of an agreement Coinbase has with Circle to get that "reward" from Circle for all USDC deposits it holds on platform. Other "rates" you can get on centralized stablecoins tend to be similar AFAICT.


Meanwhile a 4-week T-bill has a 4.16% coupon equivalent with almost no counterparty risk relative to the 4% USDC.

USDC should be paying more than T-bills to compensate for the counterparty risk.


In that case, wouldnt sp500 or vanguard be bigger risks to banks existing?

I think most people think banks make money by holding your money and giving you some interest when they actually make money by bringing money into existance out of nowhere when they issue mortgages.


I don't see why not - I'm sure the banks (or others more expert than me) would argue for stablecoins being somehow distinct in this regard, but yeah don't know why eg. Vanguard wouldn't also be a credible cause of deposit flight.

(I do vaguely remember reading that banks were concerned about people moving to money-market fund products that had bank-like functionality)


The whole point of working out is to stress the organism in order to induce a physiological adaptation. Inflammation is NOT the point, but rather an unfortunate side effect.


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