Statistics, love them or hate them

[SteveP]

a couple of statistics that have always been surprising.

A well shuffled deck of cards.
It is unlikely in history if a well shuffled deck has EVER been duplicated.
do the math, the odds against it are astronomical.
(google 52 factorial... you will see )

Many, many ( millions?) people do brackets for the NCAA bball tournament.
This year not a single bracket made it past the first round ( thanks Virginia ).
Most years something like 4 or 5 make it past round 1 and essentially zero make it further.

There are probably a bunch more like this.
anyone add any?

[monadnocky]

Not really stats, but basic math I guess.
How large a gathering of people does it take to have a 50-50 chance that two of them have the same birthday? Almost everyone answers "around 180" (i.e., roughly 365/2).
The answer is 23. And in a room of 75 people, there's a 99.99% chance that two will have the same birthday.

Oh and don't get me started on misperceptions of the normal curve and IQ
... no, I can assure you that your IQ is not 160.
(well, maybe yours is...)

[Saab2000]

My bracket is still unblemished. Warren Buffet is starting to get nervous.

[rwsaunders]

Not my quote...often attributed to Mark Twain who I believe attributed the quote to another. "There are three kinds of lies...lies, damned lies and statistics." I like this one too..."99% of all statistics tell only 49% of the story."

[Bob Ross]

I came across this tidbit in the book Darwin's Dangerous Idea by Daniel C. Dennett that I am currently re-reading for the 2nd or 3rd time:

If you held a coin-tossing tournament (set up as elimination-style, like NCAA brackets, but with ten rounds) you would only need 1,024 competitors before one of them would successfully throw ten consecutive heads.

[SteveP]

good one.

[monadnocky]

I came across this tidbit in the book Darwin's Dangerous Idea by Daniel C. Dennett that I am currently re-reading for the 2nd or 3rd time:

If you held a coin-tossing tournament (set up as elimination-style, like NCAA brackets, but with ten rounds) you would only need 1,024 competitors before one of them would successfully throw ten consecutive heads.

Read somewhere about a stats/prob professor who, on her first day of teaching the college-level course, would ask her students to write on the blackboard two conditions

1) Imagine a coin-flipping sequence of 100 flips. Write down this imaginary sequence (i.e., HHTHTTTHHTHTH and so on)
2) Actually flip a coin 100 times and write down the sequence.

The professor would not watch either of these. Upon re-entering the class, she would correctly pick the "real" sequence. She had done this, successfully, on the first day of class for many years. Never got it wrong. Had something to do with our aversion to writing down a string of more than five (or six?) "H" or "T" in a row, which I believe is likely in a string of 100 flips - anyone?
Our brains are really good at making connections (relatively speaking) and TERRIBLE with randomness.

[davids]

Not really stats, but basic math I guess.
How large a gathering of people does it take to have a 50-50 chance that two of them have the same birthday? Almost everyone answers "around 180" (i.e., roughly 365/2).
The answer is 23. And in a room of 75 people, there's a 99.99% chance that two will have the same birthday.

Right. This one makes sense once you understand numbers a little.

It's like the "miraculous" coincidence of meeting someone who knows a mutual friend/relative. I mean, I know a couple hundred people, who each know a couple hundred people, etc. Even 3 degrees of separation would offer a well over a million possible connections. So it shouldn't be surprising that two people, with a little conversation, can trace those.

On the other hand, the odds of any specific connection can be very, very low. The odds that those same two people are connected through one specific chain are very, very low - one in over a million, quite possibly.

It's our observer bias that makes those coincidences seem meaningful, rather than simply fun.

[thollandpe]

If you held a coin-tossing tournament (set up as elimination-style, like NCAA brackets, but with ten rounds) you would only need 1,024 competitors before one of them would successfully throw ten consecutive heads.

If you bet that one of those 1024 people flips 10 heads in a row, and I bet against, I think I would quickly clean you out. Try having 2046 players.

[monadnocky]

"Studies have shown that there is an 87% chance that you are full of shit."
-George Carlin

[Chad]

[robin3mj]

Always go back to Yogi.

"Baseball is 90 per cent mental. The other half is physical."

"You give 100 per cent in the first half of the game, and if that isn't enough in the second half you give what's left."

[Bob Ross]

If you bet that one of those 1024 people flips 10 heads in a row, and I bet against, I think I would quickly clean you out. Try having 2046 players.

So long as neither of us is betting on which one of the competitors will flip the ten heads in advance of the tournament, I'm gonna go w/ Dennett's 1024 number.

[choke]

92.4% of all statistics are made up.

[Tom]

So long as neither of us is betting on which one of the competitors will flip the ten heads in advance of the tournament, I'm gonna go w/ Dennett's 1024 number.

My mother-in-law was a professor of mathematics. I'm going to ask her to write the proof. That ought to end any requirement to go over there for dinner any time soon!

[SteveP]

I always do the NCAA bracket after the tournament.
Always smash it. I'll finish it up tomorrow.
davids

[davids]

I always do the NCAA bracket after the tournament.
Always smash it. I'll finish it up tomorrow.
davids

They are always more accurate when you get the timing right.

Oh yeah: Go Blue.

sports.jpg

[TTX1]

Statistics suggest that moderation only works if you don't overdo it...

[jumphigher]

I watched a roulette wheel in Las Vegas once hit 'black' a dozen+ times in a row before I stopped counting. Really surprised me and changed my perception of 50/50 chance occurances.

As to statistics though, put me in the hater's camp. I think a lot of them are meaningless.

[Bewheels]

I only pay attention to statistics when they tell me what I want to know.