Economist blog quotes UM Press author in billion-dollar cold medicine case
A letter from author Stephen Ziliak has been quoted extensively in The Economist’s View blog posted by Mark Thoma, in regards to the amicus brief filed with the Supreme Court on November 12, 2010.
Ziliak’s brief claims that the very popular cold and flu relief medication, Zicam, has been found to cause users to permanently lose their sense of smell. The amicus brief filed by Ziliak is regarded with high importance, and “it is said to be one of the top ten cases of the year as the Court's decision has general and large implications for liability, regulation, and reporting by the Securities and Exchange Commission. Billions of dollars are at stake, true. But so are billions of lives - live smells included.”
Ziliak is co-author of The Cult of Statistical Significance: How the Standard Error Costs Us Jobs, Justice, and Lives, with Deirdre N. McCloskey.
The full text from the Economist’s View blog can be found here: http://economistsview.typepad.com/economistsview/2011/01/does-statistical-significance-stink.html
Read the original UM Press blog entry on the case here: http://umichpress.typepad.com/university_of_michigan_pr/2010/12/the-cult-of-statistical-significance-author-stephen-t-ziliak-challenges-cold-medecine-in-supreme-cou.html
