Following the release of a document defending YouTuber Dream over cheating allegations written by an astrophysicist, a statistician has claimed that the report contains “amateur mistakes” and “absurd errors.”
Dream is a YouTuber who found popularity and a large fan base through his Minecraft content. Among the videos he posts for his 14 million subscribers are speedruns, in which he tries to complete Minecraft in record time.
However, his 1.16 speedrun was rejected after a December 12 video released by YouTuber Geosquare and the Minecraft Speedrun mod team claimed that the odds of the record were “too unlikely to verify.”
Dream immediately denied the claims that he cheated, and promised a more comprehensive defense to the position given some time to produce it, also saying “I’m going to be most likely hiring multiple well-renowned statisticians to look at the numbers.”
On December 23 Dream delivered his response video as promised, utilizing a full report written by an anonymous astrophysicist hired through the online science consulting company Photoexcitation.
https://youtu.be/1iqpSrNVjYQ
However, Reddit user mbf-, who claims they are a “particle physicist with a PhD in physics,” responded to Dream’s defense document penned by the astrophysicist, claiming that the report is full of problems.
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“Whoever wrote that is either deliberately manipulating numbers in favor of Dream or is totally clueless despite having working experience with statistics. Familiarity with the concepts is clearly there, but they are misapplied in absurd ways.”
They also wrote that the “amateur mistakes” that appear in the document make them question the overall qualification of the (anonymous) author.”
The physicist goes on to critique some of the math used in the report, analysing in detail some of the errors they believe to be present in their calculations.
The comment has now amassed several hundred awards from people who agree with mbf-, though Dream certainly still has his fair share of supporters.
The stats behind the allegations are so complicated that it appears this dispute will take a long time to resolve. But with each side strongly defending their position, viewers have been left unsure as to what the truth actually is.