Women concerned about their rights? They make up more than 50% of the voting population. Why do I need to look out for their interests? You want the government looking out for women's rights... easy solution--every single woman show up to vote. That's it. If 90% of women showed up to vote in 2012 I can guarantee that their interests would get nearly exclusive attention from candidates. If 90% of Latinos showed up to vote you can guarantee that their interests would be represented.
Two points. First, since the US is a representative democracy with unlimited outside and unaccountable money, there is a strong selection process that filters out anybody who seriously challenges the status quo or does not have close personal ties to big corporations. Vote in Republicans, we get corporate bailouts with no accountability. Vote in Democrats, the "anti-Wall street" wing of the corporate party, and we get... corporate bailouts with no accountability. Vote in a Republican (at the state level), and you get a "universal health care plan" that still keeps individuals at the mercy of private insurance companies. Vote in a Democrat, and you get... a "universal health care plan" that still keps individuals at the mercy of private insurance companies.
Second, you don't have to be female, Black, Muslim, gay, or whatever for an equitable society to be in your own interests. For example, allowing women access to the workplace and empowering them helps grow the economy (and is a big part of why US GDP grew so well throughout the 80's and 90's despite flat real wages). Civil rights are not about charity for the oppressed group. A fair society is in everybody's best long-term interest. Our problem is that we often pursue short term gains.
The people who will go to an election no matter what are the radicals.
"If voting changed anything, they'd make it illegal" —Emma Goldman
So, why wasn't the title "Microwave discovered to be cause of Galaxy SIII Burn"? Why are we trying to spin the headline to make it look like Samsung's making excuses for itself?
mmmm, a conspiracy theory about this community's propensity for conspiracy theories... nice!
A few notes: 1) This is not the only way she can communicate, simply the cheapest $299 + iPad). The first paragraph of the article says that much. Later on it does mention that the iPad app is the only one the girl took to right away.
The parents tried several much more expensive alternatives (including devices by the plaintiffs), but they were all too heavy or too difficult for an illiterate four-year-old to operate. They're not just going for the cheapest option
However, significance is only accurate if you propose a hypothesis BEFORE you collect data, or you account for the number of hypotheses that you COULD have tested when you started hunting for correlations.
Wagenmakers et al (2011) make a similar but slightly different point. The important thing is to distinguish between exploratory studies and confirmatory studies. In an exploratory study, hypotheses are based on correlations found after gathering data, while in a confirmatory study, the examined hypotheses are planned in advance. Both are important. Without confirmatory studies, exactly your point criticism applies, but, without exploratory studies, non-intuitive insights are difficult to come by.
This is why replications of previous studies, with new data, are so important. Research is messy enough that the first examination of a hypothesis is at least partly exploratory, and it's up to the next five research papers to replicate the original instantiation of the hypothesis on the way to exploring the next elaboration of it.
"Spock, did you see the looks on their faces?" "Yes, Captain, a sort of vacant contentment."
