Class notes
Lecture Notes Ch1-2
- Course
- COMM 291
- Institution
- University Of British Columbia (UBC )
Lecture notes of 10 pages for the course COMM 291 at UBC (Lecture Notes Ch1-2)
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COMMERCE 291 – Lecture Notes 2020 – © Jonathan BerkowitzNot to be copied, used, or revised without explicit written permission from the copyright owner.
Summary of Lectures 1 and 2
Welcome to the year 2020!
First, two questions about the year just ended, since this is Term 2019W2.
2019 has four digits: 0, 1, 2, 9.
Letter Number Coding: A=1, B=2, ..., Z=26
B E R K O W I T Z ➔
2 +5+18+11+15+23 +9+20+26 = 129
Rearrange to get: 291 = the number of our course
TWENTY NINETEEN = 193 (minus 1 ➔ 192)
Prime factors of 2019 = 3 x 673
SIX HUNDRED SEVENTY THREE = 292 (minus 1 ➔ 192)
You are the ONE needed to make our course work!
And now 2020:
Three puzzles from: Alex Bellos, The Guardian
Puzzle 1: Imagine a sports score written as 20-20. It spells out a word. Which one?
Puzzle 2: Fill in the blanks in the following “countdown” equation so it makes arithmetical
sense: 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 = 2020. You may any of the basic mathematical
operations, +, –, x, ÷, and as many brackets as you need.
Puzzle 3: The numbers guru Inder J Taneja, a retired math professor from Brazil, posed
this New Year challenge: how to create the year using a single digit. For example, here
is how you make 2020 using only 9s. (9 + 9) × (99/9 + 999)/9 = 2020.
Can you make 2020 using only 1s? Or using only 2s? Or using only any one of
the other non-zero digits? The rules are that you cannot use any of the digits more than
ten times in each of the equations. You can use all the basic operations, brackets,
exponentiation, i.e. you can use a term like 22, and (as shown above) you can
concatenate by putting digits together (e.g. 22). At least one equation is possible for
every digit from 1-9.
ANSWERS TO PUZZLES AVAILABLE UPON REQUEST!
Every number is interesting, in some way. And that means, every data set is interesting,
so Statistics is interesting, as you’ll find out this term!
By the way, a permutation of letters in a word or phrase that makes another word or
phrase is called an anagram. For example: STARTS INTO => INTRO STATS.
So let’s start into Intro Stat!
1
, What is Statistics?
Statistics… the most important science in the whole world; for upon it depends the
practical application of every other science and of every art; the one science essential to
all political and social administration, all education, all organization based on experience,
for it only gives results of our experience.” -- guess the source!
A Thumbnail History and Definition of the Subject
The word “statistic” has a purely superficial resemblance to the word “sadistic”. But the
word actually comes from the Latin word for the “state”, because the first data collection
was for the purposes of the state – tax collection and military service. Birth and mortality
rates appeared in England in the 17th century, about the same time that French
mathematicians were laying the groundwork for probability by studying gambling
problems. Applications to studies of heredity, agriculture and psychology were
developed by the great English scientists, Galton, Pearson, and Fisher, who gave us
many of techniques we use today: design of experiments, randomization, hypothesis
testing, regression, and analysis of variance.
With such a diversity of origin, it is not surprising that the word “statistics” means
different things to different people.
Small-s statistics (i.e. what are statistics?)
• numerical or quantifiable facts
• computations based on these facts (e.g. average or percentage)
• measurements, counts, ranks
• a synonym for “data”
Large-S Statistics (i.e. what is Statistics?)
• a set of methods for collecting, organizing, summarizing, presenting and
analyzing numerical facts
• generalizations or inferences about the whole based on partial knowledge rather
than complete knowledge
• decision-making in the face of uncertainty.
The author H.G. Wells wrote, about 100 years ago, that “Statistical thinking will one day
be as necessary for efficient citizenship as the ability to read and write.”
“Statistics is a set of ideas and techniques that enable the user to collect data efficiently
and then to discover what the data mean. Statistics is an applied discipline. [It] is not a
purely deductive discipline. It involves art as well as science, individual judgment as well
as careful, logical deductions.
Statistics is used as an aid to decision-making. It is used to control manufacturing
processes and to measure the success of those processes. It is used to calculate
premiums on insurance policies. It is used to identify criminals. In the health sciences,
finding a new statistical relationship between two or more variables is consider ample
grounds to write and publish yet another paper. Statistics is used to formulate economic
policy and to make decisions about trading stocks and bonds. It would be difficult to find
a branch of science, a medium to big business, or a governmental department that does
not collect, analyze, and use statistics. It is an essential science.” ~ John Tabak
2
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