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Comment by autoexec | Hacker News Reader

That seems kind of extreme. While I wouldn't take this paper as proof that the sun is causing pandemics, the correlation is an interesting bit of trivia.

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In what way is it interesting? And how is it trivia?

If there is a correlation, it’s definitely interesting, the same way all science is interesting.

lol, all science is bad at stats, and uses correlation as causation

The discussion here is not whether correlation is causation, but rather correlation is interesting because it opens an opportunity for you to explore whether it is causation or not.

No, correlation alone is not interesting at all. If you were right we should be studying how the reduction in piracy over the last few centuries is strongly correlated with the increase in global warming. Pure nonsense.

Correlation is always interesting, and until you study it, you can’t even prove that it’s “correlation alone” and nothing else. Yes correlation is not always causation. But, correlation often opens up an entry point for new research. Most of modern medicine is heavily dependent on correlation.

"Interesting" is subjective, but "trivia" is just information that is insignificant or of little use. Here are some other correlations you might find more interesting that are just as trivial as the one linking solar activity to pandemics:

When compared to the average person, people who prefer Miss Piggy over Kermit are more than twice as likely to have tattoos.

As the number of computer programmers in Kansas decline so do US burglary rates

Global average temperatures are correlated with the how many pirates there are

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