I do have to go--windows 7 finally downloaded and I'm going to install it. I'll simply comment that you're now getting into confidence intervals and the notion that as n grows larger, the calculated probability becomes more and more accurate. And I'll once again state that this is a different form of problem. Cheers. Hope to be back later.
John Doe
JoinedPosts by John Doe
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101
A riddle my brother gave me today
by bohm ina man has 2 children.
he tells you one is a boy born on a tuesday.
what is the probability the other is a boy to?.
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101
A riddle my brother gave me today
by bohm ina man has 2 children.
he tells you one is a boy born on a tuesday.
what is the probability the other is a boy to?.
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John Doe
So your saying its not possible to define the probability of events which are NOT equally likely?
No. I did not say that. However, the entire discussion has dealt with a presupposition that we are dealing with things that have equal chances of happening. That is statistics "in it's most basic form." Not to be terse, but I am not going to use my remaining post count in this pointless exchange. After all, this is becoming too much like a "math class" and I do want to have a life.
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101
A riddle my brother gave me today
by bohm ina man has 2 children.
he tells you one is a boy born on a tuesday.
what is the probability the other is a boy to?.
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John Doe
Well, i asked you earlier to give a definition without copy-pasting. Apparently that was not a problem for you back then, but here we go...
And I did. Note that 3(a)(1) is not substantially different from the definition I gave.
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101
A riddle my brother gave me today
by bohm ina man has 2 children.
he tells you one is a boy born on a tuesday.
what is the probability the other is a boy to?.
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John Doe
John, let me help you.
What is the probability the next flight to new york will fall down over the atlantic?
There are two outcomes as i see it: It fall down, or it does not.
So how do i go from those to the probability? I assume you dont want to tell me its 1/2.
Now you're changing the problem. Note the dicitonary definition involving "equally likely." Or, is the dictionary wrong too?
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101
A riddle my brother gave me today
by bohm ina man has 2 children.
he tells you one is a boy born on a tuesday.
what is the probability the other is a boy to?.
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John Doe
In my world probability is a sononymous with belief.
Why don't we see what the dictionary has to say.
Main Entry: prob·a·bil·i·ty
Pronunciation: \?prä-b?-'bi-l?-te\
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): pluralprob·a·bil·i·ties
Date: 15th century
1: the quality or state of being probable
2: something (as an event or circumstance) that is probable
3 a (1): the ratio of the number of outcomes in an exhaustive set of equally likely outcomes that produce a given event to the total number of possible outcomes (2): the chance that a given event will occur b: a branch of mathematics concerned with the study of probabilities
4: a logical relation between statements such that evidence confirming one confirms the other to some degree3 (a) leaves little room for "belief."
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101
A riddle my brother gave me today
by bohm ina man has 2 children.
he tells you one is a boy born on a tuesday.
what is the probability the other is a boy to?.
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John Doe
YOU began this by telling me probability has nothing to do with belief. Now im calling you to account on that statement.
That is correct. I stand by that statement.
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101
A riddle my brother gave me today
by bohm ina man has 2 children.
he tells you one is a boy born on a tuesday.
what is the probability the other is a boy to?.
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John Doe
John, no you have not. You have told me it is "the ratio of occurances to non-occurances".
You're quoting only part of the definition I gave. For what purpose do you take a sentence out of context?
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101
A riddle my brother gave me today
by bohm ina man has 2 children.
he tells you one is a boy born on a tuesday.
what is the probability the other is a boy to?.
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John Doe
I am allmost certain you have completed the statistics courses, and you are correcting me and slapping me over the head but you are completely and utterly wrong.
Did you not read where I conceded that I was incorrect in my initial analysis? What do you want, a pint of blood? Has there been any disagreement as to what a probability is? I get the strong impression that you are simply yanking my chain, and frankly, I grow weary of it.
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101
A riddle my brother gave me today
by bohm ina man has 2 children.
he tells you one is a boy born on a tuesday.
what is the probability the other is a boy to?.
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John Doe
A person who has any training in statistics should be able to formulate an imprecise problem and work on it from there.
Were you or were you not asking for an example? I've given a rigorous and thorough defintion of probability.
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101
A riddle my brother gave me today
by bohm ina man has 2 children.
he tells you one is a boy born on a tuesday.
what is the probability the other is a boy to?.
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John Doe
JD, wrote:
Statistics and probability, it its most basic form, is simply a ratio formulated from all possible outcomes in a given scenario. Keeping it simple, take a coin toss. One coin toss. The possible outcomes are heads and tails. (ignoring the minute chance it may land on its side) Therefore, the "probability" of any one side coming up in a single toss is the ratio of that outcome to the possible outcomes. Back to our coin toss, it's either heads or tails. Heads is one possibility. Tails is another possibility. The two, distinct possibilities, when added together, gives a total of two, to be redundant. The probability of heads occuring in one coin toss, for example, is 1 (the number of possible occurences that heads comes up) / 2 (the enumeration of the total possible occurances). Even though we are only dealing with 1 occurnce, there are 2 possible occurences.
Okay, you are not giving a definition, you are giving an example, a very long and convoluted one that is. I conclude you have still not been able to give a proper definition of what a probability is, nor give an answer to the extremely simple problem i gave you in the last post. So let me ask you again, after one has enumerated the possible outcomes of a given situation (for example, boy/girl, head/tail, side1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 of a dice), what does one do then? Complete the sentence: The probability of an event is ...
Sigh.
You have no desire to discuss the problem, do you.