Thanks for the comment. I actually spent a considerably amount of time looking for a meaningful reference. I found the Popkess-Vawter 1998 reference, but could not find the original text. Do you have a better number for "failure" or reference that I could use? I would be happy to update the post.
Re:Kanban – The Secret Engineer Killer
by jacques_chester on Sunday July 28, 2013 @11:19PM
(#6119166)
Hard to say. Either you rely on clinical studies, which give you pathologically-skewed sample bias, or you use the National Weight Control Registry, which will be skewed to people wanting to report successful weight control.
Thanks. I am not an expert in this area (diet success data) and was simply trying to use an analogy. I guess I will leave it as is. I am not sure what else to do -- it seems that leaving it with no reference would be worse.
Re:Kanban – The Secret Engineer Killer
by jacques_chester on Sunday July 28, 2013 @11:30PM
(#6119213)
Well at least you can join the noble ranks of folk whose writing was tangentially nitpicked in the very first HN comment.
Happens every time. I have learned to expect it. It does make me spend a little more time though thinking through the counter arguments that are likely to be fired like spears.
Re:Kanban – The Secret Engineer Killer
by jacques_chester on Sunday July 28, 2013 @11:40PM
(#6119254)
Comments like mine are why I always answer "please no" in those hypotheticals about meeting yourself.
But when you take the most pathological cases of obesity in a time before obesity was the norm, unsurprisingly those cases are ... pathological. There is a pathology.
These aren't normal people who grew overweight under conditions of stunning caloric abundance.
So let's stop quoting this statistic because the sample bias is kindly stupidly important to its interpretation.