Cartoon Guide to Statistics By: Larry Gonick & Woollcott Smith Chapter 1 summary Jim Casey GEOG Advanced Geographic Statistics

What is statistics? Statistics deals with uncertainty Most of us live comfortably with some level of uncertainty Our daily lives are full of situations with uncertainty For instance... The likelihood of disagreeable weather on any given day The chance of traffic going s-l-o-w and being late The possibility of the light bulb in your room burning out today The possibility that the lottery ticket you purchased will be a winner

So... What's so special about statistics? Statistics can quantify uncertainty This makes it easier to know how much uncertainty is present Examples of using statistics in the real world o preventing accidents  statistically testing the safety of flying, driving or other activities in certain conditions o establishing effectiveness of medicines  analyzing results of vaccine tests to establish the most effective medicine to use

Statistics is supported by three related disciplines Data analysis o The gathering, display and summary of data o Charts, graphs, totals, etc. Probability o laws of chance o gambling, games and 'how long will I have to wait' Statistical inference o the science of drawing statistical conclusions from specific data, using a knowledge of probability o how long until my computer screen dies?

As you continue reading... in Chapter 2, we o look at a simple data set of the reported weight of some college students Chapter 3, we o study the laws of probability - starting out with gambling Chapter 4 and 5, we o describe the world with probability models using the concept of a random variable Chapter 6, we o learn about taking samples of large populations Chapter 7 and beyond, we o learn about making statistical inferences about the real world that we live in..