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Cancer clusters will happen naturally, from basic rules of randomness that simply state that any phenomenon that is caused by random factors will not happen in a neat, regular repartition but will be randomly spread out, which includes apparently unnatural clusters that are in fact statistically normal.

It can easily be shown that a "random" distribution of points does not appear random to us. Conversely, if asked to scatter points "at random", people will usually avoid putting points close together compared with what happens in a random distribution.

[Technically: I take "random" to mean that the position of each point is independent from the position of the previous point; this can be done assuming a uniform probability per unit volume, but not necessarily. When people manufacture a "random" distribution they usually do somethin akin to what physicists call a "hard-sphere gas", that is, there is a minimum distance below which a new point won't be added, but otherwise the distribution is "random"]

Can the last politician to go out the revolving door please turn the lights off?

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Thu Jul 12th, 2007 at 11:22:01 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Is this random?

And this?

What kind of statistical test can tell the difference?

Can the last politician to go out the revolving door please turn the lights off?
by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Thu Jul 12th, 2007 at 06:50:11 PM EST
[ Parent ]
N°1 is random, N°2 is hand sprayed. (but I already had that kind of quiz long ago)

Pierre
by Pierre on Fri Jul 13th, 2007 at 03:48:42 AM EST
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Not everyone on the site is an engineer, you know? This is (sadly) not a well-known fact.

[What's the point of teaching people calculus if they never encounter this kind of stuff?]

Can the last politician to go out the revolving door please turn the lights off?

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Fri Jul 13th, 2007 at 05:29:00 AM EST
[ Parent ]

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