Measurements Properties & Issues

  • Every careful measurement in science is always given with the probable error... every observer admits that he is likely wrong, and knows about how much wrong he is likely to be. This is a quote by Welsh Mathematician and philosopher Bertrand A.W. Russell (1872 - 1970). The quote may be found in his 1931 book "The Scientific Outlook" and is also found on the science history website www.todayinsci.com
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  • The true method of knowledge is experiment. This is a quote of British poet and artist William Blake (1857 - 1827). The quote is found in his 1788 book "All religions are one".
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  • A study in the Washington Post says that women have better verbal skills than men. I just want to say to the authors of that study: 'Duh.' This a quote from American comedian and talk show host Conan O'Brien (1963 - ) delivered on his TV show "Late Night with Conan O'Brien".
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  • A cartoon to teach about the concept of independent versus dependent variables. Cartoon by John Landers (www.landers.co.uk) based on an idea from Dennis Pearl (The Ohio State University). Free to use in the classroom and on course web sites.

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  • A cartoon that might be used in teaching about data quality issues. Cartoon by John Landers (www.landers.co.uk) based on an idea from Dennis Pearl (The Ohio State University). Free to use in the classroom and on course web sites.

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  • This joke can be used to motivate class discussions on the assumptions underlying drawing conclusions from data (especially the assumption of stationarity). The joke is a revision of a story in "The Angel's Dictionary: A modern tribute to Ambrose Bierce" by Edmund Volkart - also quoted in "Statistically Speaking: A dictionary of Quotations" by Carl Gaither and Alma Cavazos-Gaither (page 62). The revision (to make the story suitable for classroom use) was written by Dennis Pearl, The Ohio State University.

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  • This interactive lecture activity motivates the need for sampling. "Why sample, why not just take a census?" Under time pressure, students count the number of times the letter F appears in a paragraph. The activity demonstrates that a census, even when it is easy to take, may not give accurate information. Under the time pressure measurement errors are more frequently made in the census rather than in a small sample.
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  • If you can't measure it, I'm not interested. A quote by Canadian educator and management theorist Laurence Johnston Peter (1919 - 1990) from "Peter's People" in "Human Behavior" (August, 1976; page 9). The quote also appears in "Statistically Speaking: A dictionary of quotations" compiled by Carl Gaither and Alma Cavazos-Gaither.

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  • A series of 19 songs used to teach Structural Equations Modeling (SEM) by Alan Reifman of Texas Tech University. A video of an in-class performance of the musical on April 27, 2007, is also available at the website. The Musical took second place in the 2007 A-Mu-sing competition.
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  • This pdf text file gives a short introduction to the methods of Bayesian inference. It gives a simple example that deals with jumping a paper frog. The topics listed in this document include: An example, comparison of frequentist and Bayesian methods, credible vs. confidence intervals, choice of prior and its effect on the posterior distribution.
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