Breakthroughs in Statistics

McCrimmon, having gotten Grierson's attention, continued: "A breakthrough, you say? If it's in economics, at least it can't be dangerous. Nothing like gene engineering, laser beams, sex hormones or international relations. That's where we don't want any breakthroughs. " (Galbraith, 1. K. (1990) A Tenured Profes sor, Houghton Miffiin; Boston. ) To judge [astronomy] in this way [a narrow utilitarian point of view] demon strates not only how poor we are, but also how small, narrow, and indolent our minds are; it shows a disposition always to calculate the payolIbefore the work, a cold heart and a lack of feeling for everything that is great and honors man. One can unfortunately not deny that such a mode of thinking is not uncommon in our age, and I am convinced that this is closely connected with the catastro phes which have befallen many countries in recent times; do not mistake me, I do not talk of the general lack of concern for science, but of the source from which all this has come, of the tendency to everywhere look out for one's advan tage and to relate everything to one's physical well-being, of the indilIerence towards great ideas, ofthe aversion to any elIort which derives from pure enthu siasm: I believe that such attitudes, if they prevail, can be decisive in catas trophes of the kind we have experienced. [Gauss, K. F. : Astronomische An trittsvorlesung (cited from Buhler, W. K. (1981) Gauss: A Biographical Study, Springer: New York)].

Auteur
Samuel Kotz, PhD, honorary Doctor of Science, is professor and research scholar at the Department of Engineering Management and Systems Engineering at George Washington University in Washington, D.C.

Texte du rabat

This is a two volume collection of seminal papers in the statistical sciences written during the past 100 years. These papers have each had an outstanding influence on the development of statistical theory and practice over the last century. Each paper is preceded by an introduction written by an authority in the field providing background information and assessing its influence. Readers will enjoy a fresh outlook on now well-established features of statistical techniques and philosophy by becoming acquainted with the ways they have been developed. It is hoped that some readers will be stimulated to study some of the references provided in the Introductions (and also in the papers themselves) and so attain a deeper background knowledge of the basis of their work.

Contenu
by S. Geisser.- Fisher, R.A. (1922) On the Mathematical Foundations of Theoretical Statistics.- by T.W. Anderson.- Hotelling, H. (1931) The Generalization of Student's Ratio.- by E.L. Lehmann.- Neyman, J. and Pearson, E.S. (1933) On the Problem of the Most Efficient Tests of Statistical Hypotheses.- by D.A.S. Fraser.- by D.A.S. Fraser.- by R.E. Barlow.- de Finetti, B. (1937) Foresight: It's Logical Laws, Its Subjective Sources.- by M.R. Leadbetter.- Cramér, H. (1942) On Harmonic Analysis in Certain Functional Spaces.- by R.L. Smith.- Gnedenko, B.V. (1943) On the Limiting Distribution of the Maximum Term in a Random Series.- by P.K. Pathak.- Rao, C.R. (1945) Information and the Accuracy Attainable in the Estimation of Statistical Parameters.- by B.K. Ghosh.- Wald, A. (1945) Sequential Tests of Statistical Hypotheses.- by P.K. Sen.- Hoeffding, W. (1948) A Class of Statistics with Asymptotically Normal Distribution.- by L. Weiss.- Wald, A. (1949) Statistical Decision Functions.- by D.V. Lindley.- by D.V. Lindley.- by I.J. Good.- Robbins, H.E. (1955) An Empirical Bayes Approach to Statistics.- by H.P. Wynn.- Kiefer, J.C. (1959) Optimum Experimental Designs.- by B. Efron.- by B. Efron.- by J.F. Bjþrnstad.- Birnbaum, A. (1962) On the Foundations of Statistical Inference.- by W.U. DuMouchel.- Edwards, W., Lindman, H., and Savage, L.J. (1963) Bayesian Statistical Inference for Psychological Research.- by N. Reid.- Fraser, D.A.S. (1966) Structural Probability and a Generalization.- by J. de Leeuw.- Akaike, H. (1973) Information Theory and an Extension of the Maximum Likelihood Principle.