|
Geek to Geek and scaring crows 14 July 2013 22:20 Statistics has never been my strong point. I think I may have mentioned before how I was twenty before I understood the difference between 'discrete' and 'non-discrete'. And this week I learned that a median is the midpoint of a range of numbers, not the point between the highest and lowest (so the media of 1,2,3,4,100 is 3, not 50*) Or is it 49. Or maybe 49.5. I don't know (or really care that much, if truth be told). I had a trip overseas this week. Only to the IOW and only for an evening (which is possibly the best length of time to go to the IOW for) and someone else paid (which is definitely the best way to go - have you seen the prices of those ferries). Entertainment on the way over was provided by watching the crew do a first aid training exercise using a Neil Robertson stretcher, which were pretty much taken out of service everywhere else at least twenty years ago. There was also a lady feeding her first baby. How do I know it was a first baby? When she dropped the spoon on the floor she got a new one out of her bag. You only do that with first babies. With subsequent ones you don't have time / don't care / realise it's not going to hurt them. Interesting contrast of technology between the mainland and the island. On the mainland the car registration recognition software had enabled the check-in clerk to print out the boarding pass before we reached his cabin. On the island check-in was done by a bloke writing on the back of a fag-packet. At work I was asked if the heading of a report that shows temperatures could be changed to "show the degree symbol rather than a superscript "o'". I asked whether there was a difference between the degree symbol and a superscript "o". I was told that there isn't, but I wonder if really there is. You read this and make up your own mind. There is, incidentally, a difference between the multiplication symbol and an "x". A dilemma based on the "seeing someone ahead of you in the street" problem (number 8 in Buzzfeed's useful list of Very British Problems). In the foyer as I was leaving work I met and briefly chatted with a colleague who was heading in a different direction. Halfway through the conversation I suddenly realised "Oh no, I'm going the wrong way. I need leave in the same direction he is going. What am I going to do?" Of course, I carried on in my original direction, and walked the long way round to my car. More geekiness to finish with. I had a raffle ticket (cloakroom style) with the number 345. My immediate thought? "That's a right-angled triangle".
Recent Entries What's changed - 21 May 2020 |
