Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
Wikipedia says: Stigler attributes the discovery of Stigler's Law to Robert K. Merton (which makes the law self-referencing). (Working as a historian of science he should have proceeded to name the law Merton's law only to find out later that actually someone had discovered it even earlier.) Ingmar [edit] On 3 Mar 2008, at 19:17, Douglas Bates wrote: On Mon, Mar 3, 2008 at 8:25 AM, Duncan Murdoch [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 3/3/2008 9:10 AM, Rogers, James A [PGRD Groton] wrote: As someone of partly French heritage, I would also ask how this distribution came to be called Gaussian. It seems very unfair to de Moivre, who discovered the distribution at least half a century earlier. :-) Just an example of Stigler's Law. Taking this to a whole new level of off topic, I wonder if Stigler's Law is self-referential? That is, should Stigler's Law more correctly be attributed to someone else? On Mar 2, 2008, at 7:33 AM, (Ted Harding) wrote: Hi Folks, Apologies to anyone who'd prefer not to see this query on this list; but I'm asking because it is probably the forum where I'm most likely to get a good answer! I'm interested in the provenance of the name normal distribution (for what I'd really prefer to call the Gaussian distribution). According to Wikipedia, The name normal distribution was coined independently by Charles S. Peirce, Francis Galton and Wilhelm Lexis around 1875. So be it, if that was the case -- but I would like to know why they chose the name normal: what did they intend to convey? As background: I'm reflecting a bit on the usage in statistics of everyday language as techincal terms, as in significantly different. This, for instance, is likely to be misunderstood by the general publidc when they encounter statements in the media. Likewise, normally distributed would probably be interpreted as distributed in the way one would normally expect or, perhaps, there was nothing unusual about the distribution. Comments welcome! With thanks, Ted. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting- guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting- guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting- guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. Ingmar Visser Department of Psychology, University of Amsterdam Roetersstraat 15 1018 WB Amsterdam The Netherlands t: +31-20-5256723 [[alternative HTML version deleted]] __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
On 4 Mar 2008, at 08:20, Ingmar Visser wrote: Wikipedia says: Stigler attributes the discovery of Stigler's Law to Robert K. Merton (which makes the law self-referencing). Stigler's law certainly applies in mathematics, where standard procedure is to name a concept in honour of the first person after Euler to have (re)discovered it. rksh (Working as a historian of science he should have proceeded to name the law Merton's law only to find out later that actually someone had discovered it even earlier.) Ingmar [edit] On 3 Mar 2008, at 19:17, Douglas Bates wrote: -- Robin Hankin Uncertainty Analyst and Neutral Theorist, National Oceanography Centre, Southampton European Way, Southampton SO14 3ZH, UK tel 023-8059-7743 __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
Douglas Bates wrote: ... Taking this to a whole new level of off topic, I wonder if Stigler's Law is self-referential? That is, should Stigler's Law more correctly be attributed to someone else? The complaint has been around for a long time. Zeno's paradox Achilles and the tortoise is said to have been first enunciated by Parmenides. Perhaps Stigler should have titled his paper Stigler's Law of Lathosonyms. Jim __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
Douglas Bates wrote: On Mon, Mar 3, 2008 at 8:25 AM, Duncan Murdoch [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 3/3/2008 9:10 AM, Rogers, James A [PGRD Groton] wrote: As someone of partly French heritage, I would also ask how this distribution came to be called Gaussian. It seems very unfair to de Moivre, who discovered the distribution at least half a century earlier. :-) Just an example of Stigler's Law. Taking this to a whole new level of off topic, I wonder if Stigler's Law is self-referential? That is, should Stigler's Law more correctly be attributed to someone else? Yes, indeed. Stigler himself attributes the idea to Robert Merton, and cites his title, 'Stigler's Law of Eponomy' as a perfect example. -- Michael Friendly Email: friendly AT yorku DOT ca Professor, Psychology Dept. York University Voice: 416 736-5115 x66249 Fax: 416 736-5814 4700 Keele Streethttp://www.math.yorku.ca/SCS/friendly.html Toronto, ONT M3J 1P3 CANADA __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
As someone of partly French heritage, I would also ask how this distribution came to be called Gaussian. It seems very unfair to de Moivre, who discovered the distribution at least half a century earlier. :-) --Jim Rogers On Mar 2, 2008, at 7:33 AM, (Ted Harding) wrote: Hi Folks, Apologies to anyone who'd prefer not to see this query on this list; but I'm asking because it is probably the forum where I'm most likely to get a good answer! I'm interested in the provenance of the name normal distribution (for what I'd really prefer to call the Gaussian distribution). According to Wikipedia, The name normal distribution was coined independently by Charles S. Peirce, Francis Galton and Wilhelm Lexis around 1875. So be it, if that was the case -- but I would like to know why they chose the name normal: what did they intend to convey? As background: I'm reflecting a bit on the usage in statistics of everyday language as techincal terms, as in significantly different. This, for instance, is likely to be misunderstood by the general publidc when they encounter statements in the media. Likewise, normally distributed would probably be interpreted as distributed in the way one would normally expect or, perhaps, there was nothing unusual about the distribution. Comments welcome! With thanks, Ted. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
On 3/3/2008 9:10 AM, Rogers, James A [PGRD Groton] wrote: As someone of partly French heritage, I would also ask how this distribution came to be called Gaussian. It seems very unfair to de Moivre, who discovered the distribution at least half a century earlier. :-) Just an example of Stigler's Law. Duncan Murdoch --Jim Rogers On Mar 2, 2008, at 7:33 AM, (Ted Harding) wrote: Hi Folks, Apologies to anyone who'd prefer not to see this query on this list; but I'm asking because it is probably the forum where I'm most likely to get a good answer! I'm interested in the provenance of the name normal distribution (for what I'd really prefer to call the Gaussian distribution). According to Wikipedia, The name normal distribution was coined independently by Charles S. Peirce, Francis Galton and Wilhelm Lexis around 1875. So be it, if that was the case -- but I would like to know why they chose the name normal: what did they intend to convey? As background: I'm reflecting a bit on the usage in statistics of everyday language as techincal terms, as in significantly different. This, for instance, is likely to be misunderstood by the general publidc when they encounter statements in the media. Likewise, normally distributed would probably be interpreted as distributed in the way one would normally expect or, perhaps, there was nothing unusual about the distribution. Comments welcome! With thanks, Ted. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
On Mon, Mar 3, 2008 at 8:25 AM, Duncan Murdoch [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 3/3/2008 9:10 AM, Rogers, James A [PGRD Groton] wrote: As someone of partly French heritage, I would also ask how this distribution came to be called Gaussian. It seems very unfair to de Moivre, who discovered the distribution at least half a century earlier. :-) Just an example of Stigler's Law. Taking this to a whole new level of off topic, I wonder if Stigler's Law is self-referential? That is, should Stigler's Law more correctly be attributed to someone else? On Mar 2, 2008, at 7:33 AM, (Ted Harding) wrote: Hi Folks, Apologies to anyone who'd prefer not to see this query on this list; but I'm asking because it is probably the forum where I'm most likely to get a good answer! I'm interested in the provenance of the name normal distribution (for what I'd really prefer to call the Gaussian distribution). According to Wikipedia, The name normal distribution was coined independently by Charles S. Peirce, Francis Galton and Wilhelm Lexis around 1875. So be it, if that was the case -- but I would like to know why they chose the name normal: what did they intend to convey? As background: I'm reflecting a bit on the usage in statistics of everyday language as techincal terms, as in significantly different. This, for instance, is likely to be misunderstood by the general publidc when they encounter statements in the media. Likewise, normally distributed would probably be interpreted as distributed in the way one would normally expect or, perhaps, there was nothing unusual about the distribution. Comments welcome! With thanks, Ted. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
Yes, the sociologist Robert Merton. url:www.econ.uiuc.edu/~rogerRoger Koenker email[EMAIL PROTECTED]Department of Economics vox: 217-333-4558University of Illinois fax: 217-244-6678Champaign, IL 61820 On Mar 3, 2008, at 12:17 PM, Douglas Bates wrote: On Mon, Mar 3, 2008 at 8:25 AM, Duncan Murdoch [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 3/3/2008 9:10 AM, Rogers, James A [PGRD Groton] wrote: As someone of partly French heritage, I would also ask how this distribution came to be called Gaussian. It seems very unfair to de Moivre, who discovered the distribution at least half a century earlier. :-) Just an example of Stigler's Law. Taking this to a whole new level of off topic, I wonder if Stigler's Law is self-referential? That is, should Stigler's Law more correctly be attributed to someone else? On Mar 2, 2008, at 7:33 AM, (Ted Harding) wrote: Hi Folks, Apologies to anyone who'd prefer not to see this query on this list; but I'm asking because it is probably the forum where I'm most likely to get a good answer! I'm interested in the provenance of the name normal distribution (for what I'd really prefer to call the Gaussian distribution). According to Wikipedia, The name normal distribution was coined independently by Charles S. Peirce, Francis Galton and Wilhelm Lexis around 1875. So be it, if that was the case -- but I would like to know why they chose the name normal: what did they intend to convey? As background: I'm reflecting a bit on the usage in statistics of everyday language as techincal terms, as in significantly different. This, for instance, is likely to be misunderstood by the general publidc when they encounter statements in the media. Likewise, normally distributed would probably be interpreted as distributed in the way one would normally expect or, perhaps, there was nothing unusual about the distribution. Comments welcome! With thanks, Ted. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
Dear Doug, As I recall, according to Stigler, yes -- he wasn't the first to formulate Stigler's law of eponymy (but I don't recall to whom he attributed it). Regards, John On Mon, 3 Mar 2008 12:17:59 -0600 Douglas Bates [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Mon, Mar 3, 2008 at 8:25 AM, Duncan Murdoch [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 3/3/2008 9:10 AM, Rogers, James A [PGRD Groton] wrote: As someone of partly French heritage, I would also ask how this distribution came to be called Gaussian. It seems very unfair to de Moivre, who discovered the distribution at least half a century earlier. :-) Just an example of Stigler's Law. Taking this to a whole new level of off topic, I wonder if Stigler's Law is self-referential? That is, should Stigler's Law more correctly be attributed to someone else? On Mar 2, 2008, at 7:33 AM, (Ted Harding) wrote: Hi Folks, Apologies to anyone who'd prefer not to see this query on this list; but I'm asking because it is probably the forum where I'm most likely to get a good answer! I'm interested in the provenance of the name normal distribution (for what I'd really prefer to call the Gaussian distribution). According to Wikipedia, The name normal distribution was coined independently by Charles S. Peirce, Francis Galton and Wilhelm Lexis around 1875. So be it, if that was the case -- but I would like to know why they chose the name normal: what did they intend to convey? As background: I'm reflecting a bit on the usage in statistics of everyday language as techincal terms, as in significantly different. This, for instance, is likely to be misunderstood by the general publidc when they encounter statements in the media. Likewise, normally distributed would probably be interpreted as distributed in the way one would normally expect or, perhaps, there was nothing unusual about the distribution. Comments welcome! With thanks, Ted. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. John Fox, Professor Department of Sociology McMaster University Hamilton, Ontario, Canada http://socserv.mcmaster.ca/jfox/ __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
--- John Fox [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Dear Doug, As I recall, according to Stigler, yes -- he wasn't the first to formulate Stigler's law of eponymy (but I don't recall to whom he attributed it). Possibly a disgruntles M. de Moivre? Regards, John On Mon, 3 Mar 2008 12:17:59 -0600 Douglas Bates [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Mon, Mar 3, 2008 at 8:25 AM, Duncan Murdoch [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 3/3/2008 9:10 AM, Rogers, James A [PGRD Groton] wrote: As someone of partly French heritage, I would also ask how this distribution came to be called Gaussian. It seems very unfair to de Moivre, who discovered the distribution at least half a century earlier. :-) Just an example of Stigler's Law. Taking this to a whole new level of off topic, I wonder if Stigler's Law is self-referential? That is, should Stigler's Law more correctly be attributed to someone else? On Mar 2, 2008, at 7:33 AM, (Ted Harding) wrote: Hi Folks, Apologies to anyone who'd prefer not to see this query on this list; but I'm asking because it is probably the forum where I'm most likely to get a good answer! I'm interested in the provenance of the name normal distribution (for what I'd really prefer to call the Gaussian distribution). According to Wikipedia, The name normal distribution was coined independently by Charles S. Peirce, Francis Galton and Wilhelm Lexis around 1875. So be it, if that was the case -- but I would like to know why they chose the name normal: what did they intend to convey? As background: I'm reflecting a bit on the usage in statistics of everyday language as techincal terms, as in significantly different. This, for instance, is likely to be misunderstood by the general publidc when they encounter statements in the media. Likewise, normally distributed would probably be interpreted as distributed in the way one would normally expect or, perhaps, there was nothing unusual about the distribution. Comments welcome! With thanks, Ted. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. John Fox, Professor Department of Sociology McMaster University Hamilton, Ontario, Canada http://socserv.mcmaster.ca/jfox/ __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
Douglas Bates wrote: On Mon, Mar 3, 2008 at 8:25 AM, Duncan Murdoch [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 3/3/2008 9:10 AM, Rogers, James A [PGRD Groton] wrote: As someone of partly French heritage, I would also ask how this distribution came to be called Gaussian. It seems very unfair to de Moivre, who discovered the distribution at least half a century earlier. :-) Just an example of Stigler's Law. Taking this to a whole new level of off topic, I wonder if Stigler's Law is self-referential? That is, should Stigler's Law more correctly be attributed to someone else? No. If Stigler's Law were named after some prior person, then it wouldn't be an example of itself. Pat On Mar 2, 2008, at 7:33 AM, (Ted Harding) wrote: Hi Folks, Apologies to anyone who'd prefer not to see this query on this list; but I'm asking because it is probably the forum where I'm most likely to get a good answer! I'm interested in the provenance of the name normal distribution (for what I'd really prefer to call the Gaussian distribution). According to Wikipedia, The name normal distribution was coined independently by Charles S. Peirce, Francis Galton and Wilhelm Lexis around 1875. So be it, if that was the case -- but I would like to know why they chose the name normal: what did they intend to convey? As background: I'm reflecting a bit on the usage in statistics of everyday language as techincal terms, as in significantly different. This, for instance, is likely to be misunderstood by the general publidc when they encounter statements in the media. Likewise, normally distributed would probably be interpreted as distributed in the way one would normally expect or, perhaps, there was nothing unusual about the distribution. Comments welcome! With thanks, Ted. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
Patrick Burns wrote: Douglas Bates wrote: On Mon, Mar 3, 2008 at 8:25 AM, Duncan Murdoch [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 3/3/2008 9:10 AM, Rogers, James A [PGRD Groton] wrote: As someone of partly French heritage, I would also ask how this distribution came to be called Gaussian. It seems very unfair to de Moivre, who discovered the distribution at least half a century earlier. :-) Just an example of Stigler's Law. Taking this to a whole new level of off topic, I wonder if Stigler's Law is self-referential? That is, should Stigler's Law more correctly be attributed to someone else? No. If Stigler's Law were named after some prior person, then it wouldn't be an example of itself. Only if said person actually was first to discover it, surely. -- O__ Peter Dalgaard Øster Farimagsgade 5, Entr.B c/ /'_ --- Dept. of Biostatistics PO Box 2099, 1014 Cph. K (*) \(*) -- University of Copenhagen Denmark Ph: (+45) 35327918 ~~ - ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) FAX: (+45) 35327907 __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
On Mon, Mar 03, 2008 at 10:22:41PM +0100, Peter Dalgaard wrote: Patrick Burns wrote: Douglas Bates wrote: On Mon, Mar 3, 2008 at 8:25 AM, Duncan Murdoch [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 3/3/2008 9:10 AM, Rogers, James A [PGRD Groton] wrote: As someone of partly French heritage, I would also ask how this distribution came to be called Gaussian. It seems very unfair to de Moivre, who discovered the distribution at least half a century earlier. :-) Just an example of Stigler's Law. Taking this to a whole new level of off topic, I wonder if Stigler's Law is self-referential? That is, should Stigler's Law more correctly be attributed to someone else? No. If Stigler's Law were named after some prior person, then it wouldn't be an example of itself. Only if said person actually was first to discover it, surely. I believe that Stigler believes that he was not the first to discover Stigler's Law. -- Andrew Robinson Department of Mathematics and StatisticsTel: +61-3-8344-6410 University of Melbourne, VIC 3010 Australia Fax: +61-3-8344-4599 http://www.ms.unimelb.edu.au/~andrewpr http://blogs.mbs.edu/fishing-in-the-bay/ __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
Andrew Robinson wrote: On Mon, Mar 03, 2008 at 10:22:41PM +0100, Peter Dalgaard wrote: Patrick Burns wrote: Douglas Bates wrote: On Mon, Mar 3, 2008 at 8:25 AM, Duncan Murdoch [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 3/3/2008 9:10 AM, Rogers, James A [PGRD Groton] wrote: As someone of partly French heritage, I would also ask how this distribution came to be called Gaussian. It seems very unfair to de Moivre, who discovered the distribution at least half a century earlier. :-) Just an example of Stigler's Law. Taking this to a whole new level of off topic, I wonder if Stigler's Law is self-referential? That is, should Stigler's Law more correctly be attributed to someone else? No. If Stigler's Law were named after some prior person, then it wouldn't be an example of itself. Only if said person actually was first to discover it, surely. I believe that Stigler believes that he was not the first to discover Stigler's Law Which is why it is an example of itself... -- O__ Peter Dalgaard Øster Farimagsgade 5, Entr.B c/ /'_ --- Dept. of Biostatistics PO Box 2099, 1014 Cph. K (*) \(*) -- University of Copenhagen Denmark Ph: (+45) 35327918 ~~ - ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) FAX: (+45) 35327907 __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
On Mar 3, 2008, at 4:59 PM, Peter Dalgaard wrote: Andrew Robinson wrote: On Mon, Mar 03, 2008 at 10:22:41PM +0100, Peter Dalgaard wrote: Patrick Burns wrote: Douglas Bates wrote: On Mon, Mar 3, 2008 at 8:25 AM, Duncan Murdoch [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 3/3/2008 9:10 AM, Rogers, James A [PGRD Groton] wrote: As someone of partly French heritage, I would also ask how this distribution came to be called Gaussian. It seems very unfair to de Moivre, who discovered the distribution at least half a century earlier. :-) Just an example of Stigler's Law. Taking this to a whole new level of off topic, I wonder if Stigler's Law is self-referential? That is, should Stigler's Law more correctly be attributed to someone else? No. If Stigler's Law were named after some prior person, then it wouldn't be an example of itself. Only if said person actually was first to discover it, surely. I believe that Stigler believes that he was not the first to discover Stigler's Law Which is why it is an example of itself... This is getting a bit silly, but I would add, unless the discoverer had the same name, cf. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stigler%27s_conjecture but I reiterate that the original attribution (by Stigler) is to Robert Merton. -- O__ Peter Dalgaard Øster Farimagsgade 5, Entr.B c/ /'_ --- Dept. of Biostatistics PO Box 2099, 1014 Cph. K (*) \(*) -- University of Copenhagen Denmark Ph: (+45) 35327918 ~~ - ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) FAX: (+45) 35327907 __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
[R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
Hi Folks, Apologies to anyone who'd prefer not to see this query on this list; but I'm asking because it is probably the forum where I'm most likely to get a good answer! I'm interested in the provenance of the name normal distribution (for what I'd really prefer to call the Gaussian distribution). According to Wikipedia, The name normal distribution was coined independently by Charles S. Peirce, Francis Galton and Wilhelm Lexis around 1875. So be it, if that was the case -- but I would like to know why they chose the name normal: what did they intend to convey? As background: I'm reflecting a bit on the usage in statistics of everyday language as techincal terms, as in significantly different. This, for instance, is likely to be misunderstood by the general publidc when they encounter statements in the media. Likewise, normally distributed would probably be interpreted as distributed in the way one would normally expect or, perhaps, there was nothing unusual about the distribution. Comments welcome! With thanks, Ted. E-Mail: (Ted Harding) [EMAIL PROTECTED] Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861 Date: 02-Mar-08 Time: 13:04:17 -- XFMail -- __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
I'm not a statistician, but do i remember well that among all distributions with a given mean and variance, the normal distribution has the highest entropy? This is good enough for me to call it normal Gabor On Sun, Mar 02, 2008 at 10:10:21AM -0600, roger koenker wrote: A nice survey of this territory is: http://books.google.com/books?id=TN3_d7ibo30Cpg=PA85lpg=PA85dq=stigler+normal+oxymoronsource=webots=OwGhmnDk3Osig=J7ou_L8-_Mu4L14c3KJAhefrD4Ihl=en I particularly like the phrase: [normal] is in this respect a rare one-word oxymoron. url:www.econ.uiuc.edu/~rogerRoger Koenker email [EMAIL PROTECTED] Department of Economics vox:217-333-4558University of Illinois fax:217-244-6678Champaign, IL 61820 On Mar 2, 2008, at 7:33 AM, (Ted Harding) wrote: Hi Folks, Apologies to anyone who'd prefer not to see this query on this list; but I'm asking because it is probably the forum where I'm most likely to get a good answer! I'm interested in the provenance of the name normal distribution (for what I'd really prefer to call the Gaussian distribution). According to Wikipedia, The name normal distribution was coined independently by Charles S. Peirce, Francis Galton and Wilhelm Lexis around 1875. So be it, if that was the case -- but I would like to know why they chose the name normal: what did they intend to convey? As background: I'm reflecting a bit on the usage in statistics of everyday language as techincal terms, as in significantly different. This, for instance, is likely to be misunderstood by the general publidc when they encounter statements in the media. Likewise, normally distributed would probably be interpreted as distributed in the way one would normally expect or, perhaps, there was nothing unusual about the distribution. Comments welcome! With thanks, Ted. E-Mail: (Ted Harding) [EMAIL PROTECTED] Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861 Date: 02-Mar-08 Time: 13:04:17 -- XFMail -- __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. -- Csardi Gabor [EMAIL PROTECTED]UNIL DGM __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
A nice survey of this territory is: http://books.google.com/books?id=TN3_d7ibo30Cpg=PA85lpg=PA85dq=stigler+normal+oxymoronsource=webots=OwGhmnDk3Osig=J7ou_L8-_Mu4L14c3KJAhefrD4Ihl=en I particularly like the phrase: [normal] is in this respect a rare one-word oxymoron. url:www.econ.uiuc.edu/~rogerRoger Koenker email [EMAIL PROTECTED] Department of Economics vox:217-333-4558University of Illinois fax:217-244-6678Champaign, IL 61820 On Mar 2, 2008, at 7:33 AM, (Ted Harding) wrote: Hi Folks, Apologies to anyone who'd prefer not to see this query on this list; but I'm asking because it is probably the forum where I'm most likely to get a good answer! I'm interested in the provenance of the name normal distribution (for what I'd really prefer to call the Gaussian distribution). According to Wikipedia, The name normal distribution was coined independently by Charles S. Peirce, Francis Galton and Wilhelm Lexis around 1875. So be it, if that was the case -- but I would like to know why they chose the name normal: what did they intend to convey? As background: I'm reflecting a bit on the usage in statistics of everyday language as techincal terms, as in significantly different. This, for instance, is likely to be misunderstood by the general publidc when they encounter statements in the media. Likewise, normally distributed would probably be interpreted as distributed in the way one would normally expect or, perhaps, there was nothing unusual about the distribution. Comments welcome! With thanks, Ted. E-Mail: (Ted Harding) [EMAIL PROTECTED] Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861 Date: 02-Mar-08 Time: 13:04:17 -- XFMail -- __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
Am 02.03.2008 um 17:44 schrieb Gabor Csardi: I'm not a statistician, but do i remember well that among all distributions with a given mean and variance, the normal distribution has the highest entropy? This is good enough for me to call it normal There's more. Among all rotation-symmetric distributions, the standard bivariate normal is the only one where x and y are independent. Also, the formula for the standard normal distribution is the only one that is its own Fourier transform. So, if we assume the same distribution for a momentum and a location of a physical object, according to Heisenberg's Law it has to be the normal. Whereas we ought to be wary about assumption of normality for the distribution of phenomena in nature, the normal and its henchmen play a defendable role when describing summaries of phenomena, like arithmetic means. I'd even go as far as buy into Youden's hype described in that Kruskal and Stigler essay. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
Johannes Hüsing johannes at huesing.name writes: Am 02.03.2008 um 17:44 schrieb Gabor Csardi: I'm not a statistician, but do i remember well that among all distributions with a given mean and variance, the normal distribution has the highest entropy? This is good enough for me to call it normal Also, the formula for the standard normal distribution is the only one that is its own Fourier transform. So, if we assume the same distribution for a momentum and a location of a physical object, according to Heisenberg's Law it has to be the normal. It's not the only one. There is also the comb function, an infinite train of evenly spaced impulse functions that is its own transform, and then there is abs(x)^-0.5 and sech(x), but I'm just reading out of the appendix of Bracewell, 1978, The Fourier Transformation and Its Applications, McGraw-Hill. best, Ken __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
There is some information and references regarding the name 'normal' in the internet article 'Earliest Known Uses of Some of the Words of Mathematics (N)', http://members.aol.com/jeff570/n.html, by John Aldrich. It contains the comment, Galton does not explain why he uses the term normal but the sense of conforming to a norm ( = 'A standard, model, pattern, type.' (OED)) seems implied. On Sun, 2 Mar 2008 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Hi Folks, Apologies to anyone who'd prefer not to see this query on this list; but I'm asking because it is probably the forum where I'm most likely to get a good answer! I'm interested in the provenance of the name normal distribution (for what I'd really prefer to call the Gaussian distribution). According to Wikipedia, The name normal distribution was coined independently by Charles S. Peirce, Francis Galton and Wilhelm Lexis around 1875. So be it, if that was the case -- but I would like to know why they chose the name normal: what did they intend to convey? As background: I'm reflecting a bit on the usage in statistics of everyday language as techincal terms, as in significantly different. This, for instance, is likely to be misunderstood by the general publidc when they encounter statements in the media. Likewise, normally distributed would probably be interpreted as distributed in the way one would normally expect or, perhaps, there was nothing unusual about the distribution. Comments welcome! With thanks, Ted. E-Mail: (Ted Harding) [EMAIL PROTECTED] Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861 Date: 02-Mar-08 Time: 13:04:17 -- XFMail -- __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
Re: [R] [OT] normal (as in Guassian)
Thanks, Katherine! Now I wonder what, in particular, Peirce might have had in mind (he was a particularly sharp philosophical thinker, and might be expected to pay attention to the semantic baggage of what he said). I'm also enjoying the other delightful OT (= On Tangent) responses that my query has prompted! Best wishes to all, Ted. On 02-Mar-08 21:19:24, Katharine Mullen wrote: There is some information and references regarding the name 'normal' in the internet article 'Earliest Known Uses of Some of the Words of Mathematics (N)', http://members.aol.com/jeff570/n.html, by John Aldrich. It contains the comment, Galton does not explain why he uses the term normal but the sense of conforming to a norm ( = 'A standard, model, pattern, type.' (OED)) seems implied. On Sun, 2 Mar 2008 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Hi Folks, Apologies to anyone who'd prefer not to see this query on this list; but I'm asking because it is probably the forum where I'm most likely to get a good answer! I'm interested in the provenance of the name normal distribution (for what I'd really prefer to call the Gaussian distribution). According to Wikipedia, The name normal distribution was coined independently by Charles S. Peirce, Francis Galton and Wilhelm Lexis around 1875. So be it, if that was the case -- but I would like to know why they chose the name normal: what did they intend to convey? As background: I'm reflecting a bit on the usage in statistics of everyday language as techincal terms, as in significantly different. This, for instance, is likely to be misunderstood by the general publidc when they encounter statements in the media. Likewise, normally distributed would probably be interpreted as distributed in the way one would normally expect or, perhaps, there was nothing unusual about the distribution. Comments welcome! With thanks, Ted. E-Mail: (Ted Harding) [EMAIL PROTECTED] Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861 Date: 02-Mar-08 Time: 13:04:17 -- XFMail -- __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. E-Mail: (Ted Harding) [EMAIL PROTECTED] Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861 Date: 02-Mar-08 Time: 21:52:20 -- XFMail -- __ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
