 |
Re: [RC] AERA - Joe LongOn Fri, 17 Oct 2003 21:23:27 -0400, Truman Prevatt <tprevatt@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: And where is it the evidence it is better reporting? Do we know any better how many horses die three days after at home? I doubt it very seriously. I would hope that even in the dark ages 5 years ago when a horse died at a ride it would have been reported. If not the organization doesn't deserve to exist. Truman ol' buddy, I have to take issue with you in this matter. The very first endurance ride I ever saw, I worked communications for the Alabama 50 as a ham radio operator in 1978. There were about 25 starters. One horse died on the trail, another went down on the trail and died the day after being trailered home. I don't have the numbers to prove it, but my recollection is that we had more horse deaths in the 1980's than we do now. When you have a low probability event (such as a horse death) and the numbers doubles for two years over the long term average in a row while the number of starts only goes up by a few percent, that is a dead on sign that something might be amiss. Well now, as a successful poker player I know this is totally wrong. Even low-probability events occur in clusters, and a rash of them proves nothing at all. I see this fallacy argued all the time on the poker-strategy newsgroup. But I've seen AA, KK and QQ dealt in the same hand. I've been eliminated from a tournement by a Royal Flush beating my Aces Full. It should surprise no one if we had two years with almost no fatalities, or two years with twice the "average" number. It is almost impossible to know if we have a genuine trend without tracking numbers (in a consistent way) for a lot more than two years. How many years are we going to have to see these numbers untill we can get rid of the "shit happens" excause and start to get serious about solving it. Apples and oranges. Even a single death is a problem, and we must always seek ways to reduce equine fatalities. But how many years must we see an increase in numbers before we know the increase is statistically meaningful? A lot more than two. To go back to the poker analogy. Most people think the "law of averages" would even out good and bad streaks fairly quickly. But both computer simulations and the experience of many long-time players shows that hot streaks and losing streaks can last for thousands of hands. Again, a thousand rides ... two year's worth ... is not enough. Not even close. I believe that a lot of the perception of things getting worse is due to the fatalities that have occured at high-profile rides. As there are only a few of these rides each year, we won't have a statisticaly meaningful trend of equine fatalities at these rides in our lifetime. We could have twice as many next year, or not a single one for the next ten years, and neither would prove anything. -- Joe Long jlong@xxxxxxxx http://www.rnbw.com =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Ridecamp is a service of Endurance Net, http://www.endurance.net. Information, Policy, Disclaimer: http://www.endurance.net/Ridecamp Subscribe/Unsubscribe http://www.endurance.net/ridecamp/logon.asp Ride Long and Ride Safe!! =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
|