Number Crunching

Mar 29, 2009 (LBO)- Consciously or unconsciously, we use statistics in everything we do in our day to day life.

When we say that it rained yesterday, we simply pronounce a fact we have observed as having happened.



When we say that it is raining now, we again mention something that we have observed as happening. When we say that it will rain tomorrow, we are predicting a future event.

Our life is full of such statements: facts that have been experienced by us in the past, facts that are happening now and being experienced in the present and facts that we feel would happen in the future. What has happened and is happening now are our personal experiences.

What will happen are our learned judgments based on our experiences. If we keep these experiences and learned judgments to ourselves, then, it would not form the subject matter of statistics. It becomes statistics only when we share them with others.

Hence, statistics is basically, observing, analysing, learning and sharing facts about the real world. That sharing of facts need not necessarily be in quantitative or measurable form.

They can be simple expressions in verbal form so that others could form opinions on the happenings in the real world.

Statis