Regression Modeling Involves Art, Science, and Poetry, Too

The statistician’s utterance “regression modeling involves art and science” implies a mixture of a skill acquired by experience (art) and a technique that reflects a precise application of fact or principle (science). The purpose of this chapter is to put forth my assertion that regression modeling involves the trilogy of art, science, and concrete poetry. With concrete poetry, the poet’s intent is conveyed by graphic patterns of symbols (e.g., a regression equation) rather than by the conventional arrangement of words. As an example of the regression trilogy, I make use of a metrical “modelogue” to introduce the machine-learning technique GenIQ, an alternative to the statistical regression models. Interpreting the modelogue requires an understanding of the GenIQ Model. I provide the interpretation after presenting the Shakespearean modelogue “To Fit or Not to Fit Data to a Model.”