205 Whittington Drive

Knoxville, TN 37923

865 773 2245

ramon48@bellsouth.net

 

 

About me

 

I am a professor of statistics at the University of Tennessee. I love statistics and its applications and rule my life using statistical principles. I love teaching statistics that I do simultaneously online and on campus. I am an avid reader of nonfiction and love to write. I love politics, policy and economics. 

 

My Library

 

My Web Sites

 

Professional: 

 

This is my site as a professor at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. It shows my professional activities including what I teach and my area of research. It also has a brief professional biography.

 

  

Thinking Straight: Fallacies, Cognitive Biases and Propaganda

 

This is my web site for the freshman seminar that I teach at the University of Tennessee to make them critical thinkers.

 

This is the seminar description: 

Assessing facts and being able to arrive at correct conclusions from them is surprisingly rare, though most everybody thinks they do. To learn to do this consistently one needs to learn about fallacies, cognitive biases and propaganda. A fallacy is a plausible reasoning that fails to satisfy the conditions of a valid argument. A cognitive bias is a person's tendency to make errors in judgment based on cognitive factors. Cognitive biases induce one to commit fallacies and make one unaware that one is doing so. Propaganda is an appeal to emotions used to lead one to commit fallacies as a means of convincing one of something desired by the propagandist. Thus, cognitive biases, coming from within ourselves, and propaganda, coming from outside ourselves, both induce one to commit fallacies and thus to invalid reasoning. This seminar discusses these topics.

 

Bringing Reason to Elections

 

This site has numerous statistical graphs pertaining to Americans' declining standard of living and what can be done about it.

 

It has a flyer with some very interesting data on the declining standard of living most Americans.

It also has a presentation that shows that

 

1.      The standard of living of most Americans is stagnant or decreasing

2.      Economic insecurity is rising precipitously

3.      How taxation has aggravated the problem

4.      The proposed tax plans of Obama and McCain

5.      How the only way to reverse the trend is a big push for more formal education

6.      Education to be effective has to start way before age five

7.      How the McCain and Obama education plans fit into this picture

 

 

My Discussion Forums

  

Thinking Straight: Paradoxes, Cognitive Biases and Propaganda

 

Assessing facts and being able to arrive at correct conclusions from them is surprisingly rare. To learn to do this consistently we need to learn about fallacies, cognitive biases and propaganda. A fallacy is a plausible reasoning that fails to satisfy the conditions of a valid argument. A cognitive bias is a person's tendency to make errors in judgment based on cognitive factors. Cognitive biases induce us to commit fallacies and make us unaware that we are doing so. Propaganda is an appeal to emotions used to lead us to commit fallacies as a means of convincing us that something false is true. Thus, cognitive biases, coming from within ourselves and propaganda, coming from the propagandist, both induce us to commit fallacies and thus to invalid reasoning. This group discusses these topics

  

 

Statistics With a Political Bearing

 

This group is currently for posting and discussing statistics with a bearing to the elections.

This includes the presentation:

 

How Are Americans Doing
How Can They Do Better
Early Childhood Education

The Facts

 

The numerous statistical graphs in this presentation -

that you can quickly scan here - show

 

1.     The standard of living of most Americans is stagnant or decreasing

2.     Economic insecurity is rising precipitously

3.     How taxation has aggravated the problem

4.     The proposed tax plans of Obama and McCain

5.     How the only way to reverse the trend is a big push for more formal education

6.     Education to be effective has to start way before age five

7.     How the McCain and Obama education plans fit into this picture

 

This group is also for discussing any facts relevant to the presidential election and the proposed policies of the presidential candidates.