a motivational message by Thomas Bayes

I found a motivational message in Bayesian statistics. It feels like a piece of advice by #GaborMate but it’s Thomas Bayes, I thought it was cool and worth sharing.

The teaching semester is done and dusted, my first “BBA year” behind me. Grades are in, and… students’ satisfaction survey results are out! 52% response ratio, 4.12 average.

Ok, the mode is 5 and I've received plenty of amazing messages of appreciation, but for some reason that score disappointed me a little bit nonetheless. It's always the tails that get under your skin. I mean, surveys can be ruthless; you put in all your time, energy, dedication, hard work, sincere care, best intentions, and passion for 6 months and someone can give you 1 star with 1 click in 1 second. I felt I did not deserve some negative ratings, and that that “output” did not correspond to my “input”.

It’s when I thought “I believe I am worth more” that I came back to my senses. For a moment I fell for it; it is so easy, mistaking some people’s satisfaction for my work, their evaluation for my worth. It's very common to mix them up and pay a price if you don’t have some awareness. Which value should we give to this kind of information then? #Bayesianstatistics came to the rescue somehow. Let’s brush it up, I think it has a positive message to share.

Have you ever heard of it? Maybe just the Bayes theorem? Here is its philosophy in a nutshell: start with an initial belief (a “prior” in Bayesian jargon) and use new data (called “evidence”) to update your initial belief. This process will give a new, informed belief (the “posterior”).

So why do I find it helpful? Here is my take, reading between the lines: whenever faced with an evaluation, take a moment to acknowledge your worth; give it the value it deserves. This will be your “prior”. Hold onto it; without it, you will be at the mercy of data (noise). Only at this point look at the opinion of others; treat it as information that can challenge or further confirm your beliefs, not as ground truth that completely overwrites them. Here “informing one’s prior” becomes a key moment of self-love and self-appreciation before confronting oneself with the outer world.

Next time you “go on stage” (a students’ or customers’ satisfaction survey, an exam, a performance review, a job interview, etc.), remember to “set your prior”: speak to yourself nicely, hold your head high, and take that evaluation with a pinch of… #Bayesian salt.

P.S. I did set my prior for this post, it's N likes. 😈