From: Tim May <tcmay@got.net>
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 15:09:39 +0800
To: cypherpunks@Algebra.COM
Subject: Re: Survey: Police Satisfaction [CNN]
In-Reply-To: <199711230158.TAA04577@einstein.ssz.com>
Message-ID: <v03102803b09d75ffa64e@[207.167.93.63]>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



At 8:11 PM -0700 11/22/97, William H. Geiger III wrote:

>In <199711230158.TAA04577@einstein.ssz.com>, on 11/22/97
>   at 08:58 PM, Jim Choate <ravage@ssz.com> said:
>
>>>      The study was based on a survey of 6,421 people, age 12 and older,
>>>      and used a sample of residents chosen to represent an entire
>>>      population. No margin of error was given.
>
>6,000 people and that represents the whole country of +250 Million.
>
>Ahhh Statistics the Mathematics of Lies.
>

The mathematics of sampling is well known, and is not the main source of
"lies." The law of large numbers, tendency to the mean, etc., are the usual
terms.

It's perfectly plausible, and common, to use samples of a few thousand to
get parameters (one of the few times this word gets used correctly) of a
population of millions, or even billions.

Bigger sources of lies are, of course, how questions are phrased.

--Tim May

The Feds have shown their hand: they want a ban on domestic cryptography
---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:----
Timothy C. May              | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
ComSec 3DES:   408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA  | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
Higher Power: 2^2,976,221   | black markets, collapse of governments.
"National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."