On The Light Side - New
Contest
The Ten Mock
Serious Commandments of Epidemiology
Submit Your
Version(s) And Win A Top Prize Of $500
We recently listened
to a podcast from This American Life entitled the Ten Commandments. It
turns out many persons or groups have issued their own versions of the
biblical ten commandments which can make for interesting and amusing
reading since some versions are serious and others are tongue in
cheek.
For example, there are
the ten commandments of Paris dining issued by Fodor’s travel guide,
and of umpiring, of sports betting, of teaching math and many others.
Epi Commandments
In fact, even
epidemiologists have not been able to resist the temptation of
creating commandments, usually of the serious kind, sometimes in
response to the perceived seven deadly sins of epidemiology! We have
also found the 10 commandments for dealing with confounding, and even
the “ten anti-commandments in epidemiology or how to fail in
epidemiology.”
Contest
The time has come to
create the final and definitive tongue in cheek version of the 10
commandments for how to succeed as epidemiologists. According to our
sources, tongue in cheek humor includes statements that are
humorously, sarcasticly or otherwise not seriously intended and should
not be taken at face value. They are mock serious in manner.
We are launching a
contest to find the best overall set of mock serious ten commandments
for epidemiologists. All readers are eligible and encouraged to submit
one or more sets of commandments to
editor@epimonitor.net
Rules
Contestants will have
approximately 60 days to submit their entries. All entries must be
received by July 31, 2019. If similar entries are received, the
earliest received will have precedence. All entries must be original,
created by the contestant, and not previously published elsewhere. The
editor reserves the right to make the final selection of the contest
winner, and all submissions become the property of the Epidemiology
Monitor. Individuals may join together as a group and submit an entry
or entries by department, school or other entity. A set must contain
at least 10 commandments. We reserve the right to nullify the contest
if too few entries are submitted, though we think this is unlikely
given all the creative entries we have received from our previous
contests!
Examples
Here are examples of
commandments from other groups. These are not intended to reflect the
humorous and mock serious commandments we are seeking but only to get
your mind thinking about commandments.
On Paris dining
·
Thou shalt not be too familiar
Don’t expect to hear “My name is Gaston and I’ll be your server
tonight.”
·
Thou shalt never use the term “doggy bag”
On Umpiring
·
Keep your eye on the ball.
·
Forget and forgive.
·
Avoid sarcasm. Don't insist on the last
word.
·
Review your work. You will find, if you
are honest, that 90% of the trouble is traceable to loafing.
On Sports
Betting
·
Honor Thy Bankroll
·
Thou Shall Not Bet With Heart Alone
·
Thou Shall Respect The Gambling Gods
On
Teaching Math
·
Thou shalt recognize that some students
fear or dislike math and be compassionate and understanding when
teaching.
·
Thou shalt convey to students that their
self worth is unrelated to their math skills.
·
Thou shalt pursue the response of "I still
don't understand" through different avenues until there is
understanding.
·
Though they may at times seem few, thou
shalt count thy blessings.
On Confonding
·
If conventional methods prove to be
inadequate, consider using newer approaches such as propensity scores,
matched sampling, instrumental variables and marginal structural
models. However, make sure you work with statisticians who understand
these new methods (not many do). When all else fails, pray! If prayer
fails, consider changing professions!! ■
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