Article View: sci.math.stat
Article #632Re: margin of error
From: r hardin
Date: Sun, 04 Oct 1992 00:56
Date: Sun, 04 Oct 1992 00:56
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> "The margin of error for this poll was +/- 3 percent." >I'd like to know what such a statement means in precise terms. The >Chebyshev inequality allows us to make statements like, "the >probability that the measured value differs from the "true" value by >more than D, is less than P." It's worse that that, you can only say ``if thus and such has a so and so distribution, then the probability ... etc'' You can't get a probability without a leading if, no matter how much sampling you do.
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Path: arc1-ca.pugleaf.net!sparky!uunet!rde!gator!fang!att!allegra!alice!rhh From: rhh@alice.att.com (r hardin) Newsgroups: sci.math.stat Subject: Re: margin of error Message-ID: <23792@alice.att.com> Date: 4 Oct 92 00:56:05 GMT Article-I.D.: alice.23792 References: <POPAT.92Oct3125308@image.mit.edu> Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill NJ Lines: 14