Wasn't Johnson describing politicians?

To this day, the stereotype that calculus takes more brains than statistics has endured.

Ah, Calculus. The Agony and dx/dt.

Groan..... but I'm gonna use that one.

Needless to say I didn't come up with that one. I saw it on a T-shirt. I had the same reaction you did - that's lame, I gotta remember it though.

It is algebra that gives me nightmares to this day.

To master statistics*, one must have a good knowledge of probability. To master probability, one must be proficient in calculus, and it helps have some knowledge of real analysis. I've been there, and done it.

*I am not referring to survey and introductory courses in statistics offered in HS and colleges. These teach only how to use statistical analyses. Some do not even do this much.

But Good Sir, today we have Matlab. What is this Real Analysis creature you speak of?

You know I'm kidding. And we both know it's the dumbing down of curriculum and entrance standards, and face it, laziness on the students part, that's led us here. Matlab is good enough and the immigrants/migrants are happy with it. And they're invading our industry and academia as well.

The computer programs SAS and SPSS (Statistics Program for the Social Sciences) have made statistics available to the masses. In the social sciences, the masses use them.

Real statisticians are rather strident in preaching the limitations of statistics. The data should be more or less just so. Normally distributed, adequate sample sizes, chosen in a truly random way. However, the packages have no way of knowing how good the data is. They spit out answers anyhow, and those answers get published in myriad social science journals. You just can't publish for the American Educational Research Association unless you have a statistical model. On the other hand, they don't have anybody who knows how to check to see if the study makes sense.

The most adept practitioners of statistics are people who make money from it, like James Simons. They are quiet about their work, but they wring tons of money from their acute observations of how other people make investment decisions.

I have found statistics to be more useful than calculus.

SAS and SPSS are tools of Satan. Social studies that attempt to apply statistical methods are variations on blind men describing an elephant -- lucky if they come up with "big, with four legs".

No doubt. Steve's old man cutting out bits of paper to get the area under a curve is not uncommon. In the building trades, guys have a lot of simple shortcuts like this to solve common problems.

That's why statistics is in the category of practical mathematics, along with algebra and basic geometry. An average guy can do a lot with these skills.

Having had a great deal of contact with the "building trades", I note that it is more common to simply order an extra sheet of plywood than it is to cut out paper triangles.

Ha! Good one.

When I was a kid I worked construction in summers and some weekends. I was a math nerd so I was astonished by how quickly working men could layout a right angle, measure out where to place pipe hangers and so forth.

I came to appreciate the value of experience, but it was the idea that good enough was usually good enough that has always stuck with me. Spending two hours making a template costs more than a sheet of plywood.

Why not? 30 inches is my elbow to my wrist bone, twice. That's how staples get spaced out on a cable run. Guaranteed to pass inspection.

Reminded me of what Ann Coulter wrote recently in defense of the English System against the Metric (in an essay on the World Cup)

"An inch is the width of a man's thumb, a foot the length of his foot, a yard the length of his belt. That's easy to visualize. How do you visualize 147.2 centimeters?"

that's a good point

While I see no benefit in preferring the metric system to the English system, people who grow up with the metric system have no difficulty visualizing dimensions in terms of metric units. Of course, when seeing "147.2" centimeters, they would visualize "about a meter and a half".

Yes, I am prejudiced because I believe Ann Coulter is a nasty bitch compared to Laura Ingraham, but still ...

Pretty sure I'm seeing correlation-without-causation creep in this comment.

Excellent, that should be a thing, CWCC

Meh. Such a wise guy.

Harumph.

You're right, the visualization thing is tricky. A lot of guys see 3-4", but visualize 6-7".

Well it is a comparative science directly impacted by the size of the lady's ass.

What are you, a homophobe?

And some guys act like 147.2 cm.

After many years in metric-system countries I have learned how to do most conversions in my head. The question remains, "how much is that, really?" Yesterday was 32 degrees C. Is that hot? I need to say to myself, 90F - hot.

Metric is useful in the kitchen, in that weight, volume and dimensions are logically related. A liter of water weighs a kilogram. It is a cube 10cm on a side. That's 4".

My misspent yute was visited upon South America. It was a few years before I could heft a pound of hamburger and think "okay, that's about a pound", instead of "okay, that's about 500 grams".

No one cooks love that. Come on.

*groan* I like Coulter, sometimes she's awesome, but sometimes she sounds like such a ditz. She has this way of being great and then suddenly saying some of the stupidest sh*t you could imagine.

Obviously when you are raised with the metric system it is ingrained and no problem at all to visualize dimensions. But because she was not, she thinks it's hard for everyone in the world to. This is so moronic. How can such a sharp mind say such dumb sh*t?!

I didn't see it that way. Rather, Americans have been told repeatedly how superior the MS is and that we were behind the times for not adopting it fully. I think she simply was recognizing that it does make sense in a way that's been overlooked and forgotten.

"Americans have been told repeatedly how superior the MS is and that we were behind the times for not adopting it fully"
I don't, have never felt that.

To me the Metric System is beautiful but I'm an engineer so numbers mean a lot to me and systems are important to me.

It sounds quaint Theodora to get excited about Coulter (I admit she is a fun writer and says tons of great stuff) and defend a medieval measurement system but in fact it's NOT quaint and cool. It's just...antiquated. I'm a scientist. I'm also a real US patriot. But the US system is just antiquated. The metric system is beautiful and the only system that makes sense.
We are not an island in the world, TA.
And we should instigate white children to be world-class measurers, scientifically, inquiringly.

Yes, I simply was explaining how Coulter sees Americans have their reasons. And, to be fair, Americans did build a world-class manufacturing economy using the ES.

Well they sure did. And if it was up to me I wish we'd grow some balls and establish that we're going to keep the ES, world opinion be damned. But we know about the US and having any balls in 2014, don't we?

Yes, real leadership is sadly lacking.

Think of the background assumptions of the metric and standard systems. One makes mankind the measure of all things, the other makes the cosmos the measure. The latter leads to all sorts of harmful assumptions.

Metric isn't 'beautiful'; it's just easy for scientists and engineers who need to solve formulas.

The strength of the metric system is that the math is easier so there are fewer mistakes. Army engineers have to measure out time fuse using yards, feet and inches. They gave us tape measure that were only in these units. I had to sit down and pencil out calculation that I could have done in a few seconds in my head just by moving the decimal point around. Of course, occasionally a mistake was made. Imagine you set your time fuse for ten minutes. You ignite the fuse and then head into the trench and wait for the boom. After ten minutes and no boom, you start to wonder if you didn't miscalculate on the lenght of the time fuse, or was it just a dud. Eventually you have to go out there and physically check it out. If it was a miscalculation, your demo package could explode as you walk up to it. Bottom line, the metric system is faster and safer.

The Imperial system is based on anthropomorphic lengths and weights - that's its strength. It's weakness is that the various units are not divisible by factors of ten. 1 mile = 5,280 feet = 63,360 inches; while 1 km = 1000 meters = 100,000 cm, etc.

Most 3D game engines use the metric system for this reason.

BTW, how's school going?

I think you tried to insult me in a vague way by asking me "how's school going" so I'm not really interested in anything you're trying to say.
You also don't offer anything at all for the subject so I'm just going to write you off. I've appreciated you Pere Marsenne a lot in the past so I'll just say you drank too much this evening. See you tomorrow.

Oh God. Not my intention at all. Sorry about that. I guess I came off as being a wannabe-know-it-all. I was genuinely interested in how you are doing. I'm fooling with Unity right now, not getting far.

Maybe it would be easier if you laid off the booze a bit, eh?

Ha!
Le Pere Mersenne is always forgiven!

I can breathe again, thanks.

Weren't you the one who's learning video game development?

I may have said that to someone when I was toying with them. I think I remember.

Ok. That explains a lot of my misunderstanding then.

[strangled snort]

Didn't mean it as joke. See my apology to AC below.

Hold yourself. Just wrap your own arms around your body and move side to side. There you go. Feels ok, huh? There you go. There you go. Easy. It's going to be ok, JJS. You're going to find a relationship with someone someday. I know as soon as we don't see you infesting these pages, I'll know--JJS found a little friend, and it will be touching.
Good luck, little pal. I think we're all rootin' for ya, even if everyone thinks you're a nasty little dick, we all hope you'll find someone and leave us alone.

I wonder why Europe never transitioned to the metric clock and calendar. So neat and regular. What sort of number is 365.25? Or 52? Or 7, 24, or 60? They surely don't relate to each other like they ought. /sarc.

I wonder why Europe never transitioned to the metric clock and calendar.

It's not like they didn't try.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wi...

The metric system is a byproduct of the French Revolution (so, it's something else we can blame on the French).

A lot of traditional measurements were based on some personage. A foot being the length of the king's foot, a yard being the length from his nose to his thumb, etc. Also, different towns had their own weights and measures, one example that has survived is the Troy ounce, from Troyes, France.

The Revolution gave the science types a chance to kill two birds with one stone. First, divorce weights and measures from the hated nobility and, second impose a common standard for the entire nation. So instead, they based everything on nature since these guys were big fans of Rousseau.

Whatever system used is pretty much irrelevant as long as everyone uses the same one for the same purpose. A European airline pilot driving to work will think of distance in kilometers and speed in km/h. Once he gets into the cockpit, he has no problem in dealing with distance in nautical miles, speed in knots, and altitude in feet. It works because all other pilots are doing the same thing.