Glasseye

Issue 24: April 2026

To celebrate two years of Glasseye we are going to do something a little different in this issue. No dunghill or white stuff or semi-supervised this month. Instead a resource which should be invaluable in your day-to-day dealings with senior management, with the marketing department, with management consultants and with software vendors. My sincere hope is that the following will help you translate the instructions given by these dedicated professionals into something you can act upon. This should be especially helpful if you are early in your career, and perhaps still inclined to take people at their word.

Enough preamble. Glasseye is proud to present...

A dictionary of bullshit for statistics, AI and data science

accuracy /ˈæk.jə.rə.si/ noun 1. The degree to which predictions match reality within a subset of the data selected to yield the highest possible accuracy. 2. Whichever of the true positive rate and the true negative rate is the most impressive.

actionable insight /ˈæk.ʃən.ə.bəl ˈɪn.saɪt/ noun An insight that would have made a substantial difference had it not been forgotten by the end of the meeting: Our Insight Engine is our live repository of strategic answers, data-driven guides, and actionable insights designed to demystify the future of marketing.¹

adaptive /əˈdæp.tɪv/ adj As yet non-existent, therefore capable of being anything: Our production-grade models are adaptive, responsive and state-of-the-art.

adstock /ˈæd.stɒk/ noun (archaic) A model of advertising impact that, despite its apparent simplicity, is able to generate surprisingly detailed and specific media plans.

agentic /eɪˈdʒen.tɪk/ adj 1. Possibly useful because able to do something. 2. Having the potential to cause chaos: Agentic AI tools have the potential to speed up diagnosis by prioritising urgent requests. (NHS)

AI /ɑː.i/ noun 1. A blanket term covering all forms of technology from the spade to the quantum computer: We will be using AI to leverage our in-garden harvesting capabilities. 2. A chat bot.

AI-driven /ˌɑː.iˈdrɪv.ən/ adj 1. Initially driven by the misconception that AI might be useful: Accelerate application modernization with AI-driven discovery, analysis, and delivery. 2. Funded by a business’s AI budget though not directly involving AI.

analytics /ˌæn.əlˈɪt.ɪks/ noun Any activity involving numbers: Our service comes with extensive analytics capabilities.

correlation /ˌkɒr.əˈleɪ.ʃən/ noun A relationship between events that is unlikely to be causal but which can be treated as such for the sake of having something interesting to say.

CAIO /ˌsiː.eɪ.aɪˈəʊ/ noun Chief AI Officer. A literature graduate who has been placed in charge of a team of highly qualified engineers and mathematicians.

CHAID /tʃeɪd/ noun (archaic) Primitive classification tool, no longer in use except in isolated research communities still under the guardianship of SPSS.

data-driven /ˈdeɪ.tə ˈdrɪv.ən/ adj Not based on a whim.

data point /ˈdeɪ.tə pɔɪnt/ noun (Silicon Valley) An item of information recently acquired by a tech-bro: That data point is completely out-of-sample. I’m going to need to adjust my priors. (See entries for out-of-sample and prior.)

decisioning /dɪˈsɪʒ.ən.ɪŋ/ noun A form of decision making that is more efficient because it has fewer syllables: Builds and runs AI agents that automate content creation, personalization and decisioning across brands, markets and functions.

deep /diːp/ adjective In existence since the 1970s but dramatically enlarged over the last two decades: We have been using deep learning AI and deep neural networks to bring intelligence to advertising.

digital twin /ˈdɪdʒ.ɪ.təl twɪn/ noun A model of something real.

directional /dɪˈrek.ʃən.əl/ adj 1. An estimate so poor that the best that can be said about it is that it is not negative when it should be positive and vice versa. 2. Wrong, but you get what you pay for: Inform the client that our estimates of their ROI are directional.

engagement /ɪnˈɡeɪdʒ.mənt/ noun An abstract quantity that has the advantage that no-one really knows what it is: Customer engagement has increased this quarter by 1.6%.

enterprise-ready /ˈen.tə.praɪz ˈred.i/ adj Far enough behind the cutting edge that it is capable of being integrated with the Microsoft product suite: Our tool orchestrates enterprise-ready agents with built-in context, controls and observability, so teams move from pilot to secure production in weeks, not months.

fine-tuned /ˌfaɪnˈtjuːnd/ adj Out-of-the-box.

generative AI /dʒen.əˈreɪ. ɑː.i/ noun Probabilistic layer added to deterministic systems to introduce uncertainty.

hypothesis /haɪˈpɒθ.ə.sɪs/ noun A thought that is too technical-sounding to be disagreed with.

key driver /kiː ˈdraɪ.və/ noun A variable that has been included in a model because the data is available.

model fitting /ˈmɒd.əl fɪtɪŋ/ noun The practice of selecting the variables and functional form for a model to produce the greatest amount of happiness in a client.

next-generation /nekst ˌdʒen.əˈreɪ.ʃən/ adj Dating back to the 1970s: Our latest wave of predictive models are truly next-generation.

optimise /ˌɒp.tɪ.maɪˈze/ verb 1. Improve slightly. 2. Use a mathematical process to reach a pre-specified outcome: We used state-of-the-art modelling to optimise our client’s media plan.

out-of-sample /aʊt əv ˈsɑːm.pəl/ adj (Silicon Valley) Surprising.

one-pager /wʌn ˈpeɪ.dʒə/ noun The final form taken by a lengthy and thorough piece of analysis once stripped of subtleties, caveats and technical details: Could you turn that report on the effectiveness of our search algorithm into a one-pager for the CTO?

predictive /prɪˈdɪk.tɪv/ adj Somewhere between infallible and fractionally better than a guess: Our agent-built machine learning solutions were found to be highly predictive.

predictive intelligence /prɪˈdɪk.tɪv ɪnˈtel.ɪ.dʒəns/ noun Intelligence.

prior /ˈpraɪ.ə/ noun Whatever a tech bro happens to believe at any given moment, based on very little evidence.

p-value /ˈpiː.væl.juː/ noun The probability of a robust test given the amount of wishful thinking.

real-world /ˌrɪəlˈwɜːld/ adj non-fantastical: Our analytics team is focussed on real-world outcomes.

R-squared /ɑːˈskweəd/ noun Final arbiter of whether or not a regression model is fit for purpose. A model with a sufficiently high R-squared needs no further qualification.

signal /ˈsɪɡ.nəl/ noun 1. Energy wave emitted from datasets that, once harnessed, has the power to transform a business: Leverage trillions of signals, advanced AI, and privacy-first collaboration to unlock new levels of growth. 2. A pattern.

significant /sɪɡˈnɪf.ɪ.kənt/ adj 1. Negligible but not due to chance. 2. Substantial but completely random.

simulation /ˌsɪm.jəˈleɪ.ʃən/ noun Method for producing data when there isn’t any.

SPSS /ˌes.piː.esˈes/ noun (archaic) Ancient surveying technology carefully preserved in its original state by the market research community. 2. Device for turning a single data file into two separate but unusable data files.

storytelling /ˈstɔː.riˌtel.ɪŋ/ noun 1. The crafting of an engaging narrative that will bring an otherwise dry piece of analysis to life. 2. Overfitting. 3. Lying.

synthetic /sɪnˈθet.ɪk/ adj Fake.

synthetic respondent /sɪnˈθet.ɪk rɪˈspɒn.dənt/ noun A simulation of an ultra high net worth individual obtained by averaging blog posts, online fan fiction and fake product reviews.

touch point /tʌtʃ pɔɪnt/ noun 1. Any event recorded in a customer database, no matter how trivial. 2. Unwanted attention from a business.

test and learn /test ænd lɜːn/ An activity mentioned on the last slide of a presentation on the understanding that no business has the patience or self-discipline to carry it out.

value /ˈvæl.juː/ noun A rare substance obtained through data mining: “Our data team are busy extracting value from the data as we speak.”

weighting /ˈweɪ.tɪŋ/ noun A mathematical technique that transforms the survey actually executed into one that you would like to have executed.

For more on these topics - for example, on CHAID, synthetic respondents, weighting, techbro-speak, and the changing meaning of “AI” - see the full list of posts for the dunghill.

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1. Many of the usage examples are real, although, out of kindness, I have not provided the sources.