Question

Suggest some classification tasks for which either false positive or false negative classifications (or both) would be undesirable. For these tasks, what proportion of false-negative (positive) classifications would you be willing to accept in order to reduce the proportion of false positives (negatives) to zero?

Answer 1

In a false positive situation, I would reject a null hypothesis that is true. So, the test would show that my masterpiece is actually mediocre or worse. Remember this phrase? That was the false negative from the previous example.

What this shows is that the two errors are interchangeable. Therefore, it is all about the design of your study; you can change things to help you avoid the bigger problem.

This would occur if, say, this article was a masterpiece of blog writing, but my test shows me that it is not even mediocre. Of course, I will not attempt to write articles in this style any time soon. However, I am a driven person that learns from his ‘mistakes’ so instead try different techniques and potentially create even better writings.

This is not the best outcome, I may have missed an opportunity but that is in no way as devastating as the false positive where I believe I have done something to improve my career but instead potentially ruined it.