Joint Statistical Meetings 2015

At the annual Joint Statistical Meetings of the American Statistical Association, held this year in Seattle, Washington, Megan Price gave a talk on developing a career in statistics. (Details here.) Patrick Ball, executive director of HRDAG, presented an invited paper, “Doing Good with Data Viz,” on August 12. (Details here.) “In the measurement of mass violence, nearly all the data are convenience samples with unknowable biases. Estimation transforms the bias into variance. That is, estimation adjusts the observed measurement to a less-biased point estimate within a estimated range of uncertainty, i.e., a confidence or credible interval. This paper presents three graphical representations of the uncertainty in estimates used in the analysis of war crimes, including in graphs used for publications and in reports used for expert testimony. Examples will include analysis used in the trials of the former heads of state of Yugoslavia, Guatemala, and Chad.”