Statistics – Page 287 – William M. Briggs

A Bust—I mean must—Read; Or, An Evolution in Bra Sizes

"Excuse me, miss. Would you care to participate in science?" Sometimes being a statistician is enviable. In a flash of scientific brilliance, Australian statisticians have just completed a massive study…

Fun Statistics

M. Night Shyamalan, Mel Gibson, and John Wayne

Part II of the Two-Envelope problem was not too friendly, so here's something that is. Via HotAir, I came across the site Marginal Revolution, in which was featured a graph…

Philosophy Statistics

The Two-Envelope Problem Solution: Part II

Read Part I first. We are in the peek first game here. The distribution of N When X is odd, and all X are discrete, we know we should always…

Philosophy Statistics

The Two-Envelope Problem Solution: Part I

Another probability "paradox", the two-envelope problem1, goes like this: Before you are two envelopes, A and B. One of them contains $X and the other $2X (which is equivalent to…

Statistics

St Petersburg Paradox; Games and Statistical Decisions; RIP David Blackwell

David Blackwell, who died two weeks ago, was one of the first mainstream statisticians to "go Bayesian." And for that and his unique skill in clearly explaining difficult ideas, we…

Statistics

How to Fool Yourself—And Others—With Statistics

See the news box to the left. I wrote this long ago and never used it. I do not love it. But since I am so busy, I haven't the…

Statistics

US Military Fatality Statistics: Have Suicides Increased?

All statistics were gathered from this DOD site. 2010 numbers were current as of 5 June this year; they were not part of the plots below. In 1983, the year…

Fun Statistics

World Cup Predictions Verified

All that was missing was the water for the players to plunge into. Still, referee Howard Webb must be a fan of the aquatic and artistic sport of diving, and…

Bobby Dress on How To Tell How Much Of “IQ” Is Inherited & How Much Is EnvironmentDecember 15, 2025
I’m fairly certain that obtaining my degree from Cornell had the unintended consequence of lowering whatever theoretical IQ I might…
JRob on How To Tell How Much Of “IQ” Is Inherited & How Much Is EnvironmentDecember 15, 2025
I love this debate about the heritability of intelligence. The smart people use a lot math about Gaussian and Pareto…
John Pate on How To Tell How Much Of “IQ” Is Inherited & How Much Is EnvironmentDecember 15, 2025
We know we don't understand consciousness let alone intelligence. IQ testing gets a bad rep though, it's a proxy for…
Cary D Cotterman on How To Tell How Much Of “IQ” Is Inherited & How Much Is EnvironmentDecember 15, 2025
I've observed seemingly vast differences in intelligence between singleton siblings raised in the same home (the gap from my wife…
NLR on How To Tell How Much Of “IQ” Is Inherited & How Much Is EnvironmentDecember 15, 2025
I appreciate the researchers putting a table with the specific people and their scores. The 1937 book which the first…