- A statistician is a mathematician broken down by age and sex.
- In earlier times, they had no statistics, and so they had to fall
back on lies. - STEPHEN LEACOCK
- A statistician is a person who draws a mathematically precise line from an unwarranted assumption to a foregone conclusion.
- A statistician is someone who loves to work with numbers but doesn't have the personality to be an accountant. In other words,
A statistician is an accountant without the charisma.
- It is proven that the celebration of birthdays is healthy. Statistics show that those people who celebrate the most birthdays become the oldest.
- A couple of months in the laboratory can frequently save a couple of hours in the library.
- The 50-50-90 rule: Anytime you have a 50-50 chance of getting something right, there's a 90% probability you'll get it wrong.
- A mathematician, an applied mathematician, and a statistician all apply for the same job. At the interview, they are asked the question, what is 1+1.
The mathematician replies, "I can prove that it exists but not that it is unique."
The applied mathematician, after some thought, replies, "The answer is approximately 1.99, with an error in the region of 0.01."
The statistician steps outside the room, mulls it over for several minutes, and eventually returns in desparation and inquires, "So what do you want it to be?"
- The Biologist, the Statistician, the Mathematician, and the Computer Scientist
A biologist, a statistician, a mathematician, and a computer scientist are on a photo-safari in Africa. They drive out into the savannah in their jeep, stop, and scour the horizon with their binoculars.
The biologist: "Look! There's a herd of zebras! And there, in the middle: a white zebra! It's fantastic! There are white zebras! We'll be famous!"
The statistician: "It's not significant. We only know there's one white zebra."
The mathematician: "Actually, we know there exists a zebra which is white on one side."
The computer scientist: "Oh no! A special case!"
- A man who travels a lot was concerned about the possibility of a bomb on board his plane. He determined the probability of this, found it to be low but not low enough for him. So now he always travels with a bomb in his suitcase. He reasons that the probability of two bombs being on board would be infinitesimal.
- The Physicist, the Chemist, and the Statistician
Three professors (a physicist, a chemist, and a statistician) are called in to see their dean. Just as they arrive the dean is called out of his office, leaving the three professors there. The professors see with alarm that there is a fire in the wastebasket.
The physicist says, "I know what to do! We must cool down the materials until their temperature is lower than the ignition temperature and then the fire will go out."
The chemist says, "No! No! I know what to do! We must cut off the supply of oxygen so that the fire will go out due to lack of one of the reactants."
While the physicist and chemist debate what course to take, they both are alarmed to see the statistician running around the room starting other fires. They both scream, "What are you doing?"
To which the statistician replies, "Trying to get an adequate sample size."
- A musician drove his statistician friend to a symphony concert one evening in his brand new mid-sized Chevy. When they arrived at the hall, all the parking spots were taken except one in a remote, dark corner of the lot. The musician quickly maneuvered his mid-sized Chevy into the space and they jumped out and walked toward the hall. They had only taken about ten steps when the musician suddenly realized he had lost his car key. The statistician was unconcerned because he knew the key had to be within one standard deviation of the car. They both retraced their steps and began searching the shadowed ground close to the driver's door. After groping on his hands and knees for about a minute, the musician bounced to his feet and bolted several hundred yards toward a large street light near the back of the concert hall. He quickly got down on all fours and resumed his search in the brightly lit area. The statistician remained by the car dumbfounded knowing that the musician had absolutely zero probablity of finding the key under the street light.
Finally, after fifteen minutes,the statistician's keen sense of logic got the best of him. He walked across the lot to the musician and asked, "Why in the world are you looking for your key under the street light? You lost it back in the far corner of the lot by your car!"
The musician in his rumpled and stained suit slowly got to his feet and muttered angrily, "I KNOW, BUT THE LIGHT IS MUCH BETTER OVER HERE!!"
*Thanks to the late Professor Robert Rumery for telling me a variation of this story. If you are a musician, the lesson of this tale is: IF YOU GO MORE THAN THREE STANDARD DEVIATIONS FROM MIDDLE C YOU WILL NEVER FIND THE RIGHT KEY!
- The Japanese eat very little fat and suffer fewer heart attacks than the British or the Americans.
On the other hand, the French eat a lot of fat and also suffer fewer heart attacks than the British or the Americans.
The Japanese drink very little red wine and suffer fewer heart attacks than the British or the Americans.
The Italians drink excessive amounts of red wine and also suffer fewer heart attacks than the British or the Americans.
Conclusion: Eat and drink whatever you like. It's speaking English that kills you.
- Two statisticians were flying from L.A. to New York. About an hour into the flight, the pilot announced, "Unfortunately, we have lost an engine, but don't worry: There are three engines left. However, instead of five hours, it will take seven hours to get to New York."
A little later, he told the passengers that a second engine had failed. "But we still have two engines left. We're still fine, except now it will take ten hours to get to New York."
Somewhat later, the pilot again came on the intercom and announced that a third engine had died. "But never fear, because this plane can fly on a single engine. Of course, it will now take 18 hours to get to New York."
At this point, one statistician turned to another and said, "Gee, I hope we don't lose that last engine, or we'll be up here forever!"
- It's like the tale of the roadside merchant who was asked to explain how he could sell rabbit sandwiches so cheap. "Well," he explained, "I have to put some horse-meat in too. But I mix them 50:50. One horse, one rabbit." (Darrel Huff, How to Lie with Statistics)
- PROOF THAT ALL ODD NUMBERS ARE PRIME:
Mathematician - 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, the rest follows by induction.
Statistician - 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is expermental error so throw it out, 11 is prime, 13 is prime, the rest follows by induction.
Engineer- 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is prime, ....
- Hello, this is probably 438-9012, yes, the house of the famous statistician. I'm probably not at home, or not wanting to answer the phone, most probably the latter, according to my latest calculations. Supposing that the universe doesn't end in the next 30 seconds, the odds of which I'm still trying to calculate, you can leave your name, phone number, and message, and I'll probably phone you back. So far the probability of that is about 0.645. Have a nice day.
- THE TRUE BELL (OR NORMAL) CURVE -- The distribution of SUCCESS in life in relationship to AGE follows a true bell curve:
At age 5 success is not peeing in your pants
At age 10 success is having friends
At age 16 success is having your driver's license
At age 20 success is having sex
At age 35 success is having money
At age 50 success is having money
At age 65 success is having sex
At age 70 success is having your driver's license
At age 75 success is having friends
At age 80 success is not peeing in your pants
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