I suspect that have over formulated the problem, and I doubt if any answer you receive will help. Try describing the biological problem you are working on -- give us some background.
Rich Strauss wrote: > (My apologies if you've received this before. I was somehow > unsubscribed from Edstat without my knowledge and had to resubscribe, > with some of my user options changing in the process.) > > I have what seems to be a fairly simple and common problem: given an > estimate of the probability of occurrence of an event and a desired > level of confidence (CL), I'm interested in estimating the minimum > sample size (Nmin) needed to be CL% confident of observing the event > (based on the conventional "frequentist" concept of confidence). I've > done some extensive simulations as so can predict what I need, down to > probabilities of occurrence of 1e-5. However, I can't seem to match > these to theory. I know how to estimate the Nmin needed to estimate a > proportion within a specified tolerance, but can't see how to apply that > to this problem. I've scanned quite a few stats texts and have done > Google and Scirus searches but can't locate what I need. Can anyone > suggest a lead or something to read? > > Rich Strauss > > > ============================================================= > Dr. Richard E. Strauss (806) 742-2719 > Biological Sciences (806) 742-2963 Fax > Texas Tech University [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Lubbock, TX 79409-3131 > <http://www.biol.ttu.edu/Strauss/Strauss.html> > ============================================================= > > . > . > ================================================================= > Instructions for joining and leaving this list, remarks about the > problem of INAPPROPRIATE MESSAGES, and archives are available at: > . http://jse.stat.ncsu.edu/ . > ================================================================= -- Bob Wheeler --- http://www.bobwheeler.com/ ECHIP, Inc. --- Randomness comes in bunches. . . ================================================================= Instructions for joining and leaving this list, remarks about the problem of INAPPROPRIATE MESSAGES, and archives are available at: . http://jse.stat.ncsu.edu/ . =================================================================
