In statistical computations, intuition can be very misleading
Guess Again
Even hardened scientists can make mistakes when interpreting statistics. Mathematical experiments can give you the right ideas to prevent this from happening, and quick simulations in Perl nicely illustrate and support the learning process.
If you hand somebody a die in a game of Ludo [1], and they throw a one on each of their first three turns, they are likely to become suspicious and check the sides of the die. That's just relying on intuition – but when can you scientifically demonstrate that the dice are loaded (Figure 1)? After five throws that all come up as ones? After ten throws?
Each experiment with dice is a game of probabilities. What exactly happens is a product of chance. It is not so much the results of a single throw that are relevant, but the tendency. A player could throw a one, three times in succession from pure bad luck. Although the odds are pretty low, it still happens, and you would be ill advised to jump to conclusions about the dice based on such a small number of attempts.
The Value of p
For this experiment, a scientist would start by defining a so-called null hypothesis (e.g., "The die is fair" or "The medication shows no effect in patients"). On the basis of the test results, this hypothesis would be either confirmed or rejected later on. The mistake of rejecting a correct null hypothesis is known by statisticians as a "Type I error" or an "Error of the first kind." Experiments define up front the maximum acceptable probability of this event happening; this value is known as the significance level of the experiment.
[...]
Buy this article as PDF
(incl. VAT)
Buy Linux Magazine
US / Canada
UK / Australia
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Support Our Work
Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you’ve found an article to be beneficial.
News
-
EndeavorOS Mercury Neo Available
A new release from the EndeavorOS team ships with Plasma 6.3 and other goodies.
-
Fedora 42 Beta Has Arrived
The Fedora Project has announced the availability of the first beta release for version 42 of the open-source distribution.
-
Dash to Panel Maintainer Quits
Charles Gagnon has stepped away as maintainer of the popular Dash to Panel Gnome extension.
-
CIQ Releases Security-Hardened Version of Rocky Linux
If you're looking for an enterprise-grade Linux distribution that is hardened for business use, there's a new version of Rocky Linux that's sure to make you and your company happy.
-
Gnome’s Dash to Panel Extension Gets a Massive Update
If you're a fan of the Gnome Dash to Panel extension, you'll be thrilled to hear that a new version has been released with a dock mode.
-
Blender App Makes it to the Big Screen
The animated film "Flow" won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature at the 97th Academy Awards held on March 2, 2025 and Blender was a part of it.
-
Linux Mint Retools the Cinnamon App Launcher
The developers of Linux Mint are working on an improved Cinnamon App Launcher with a better, more accessible UI.
-
New Linux Tool for Security Issues
Seal Security is launching a new solution to automate fixing Linux vulnerabilities.
-
Ubuntu 25.04 Coming Soon
Ubuntu 25.04 (Plucky Puffin) has been given an April release date with many notable updates.
-
Gnome Developers Consider Dropping RPM Support
In a move that might shock a lot of users, the Gnome development team has proposed the idea of going straight up Flatpak.