Re:Not Your Grandmother's Textbook Exercise
by d1sxeyes on Friday September 02, 2022 @01:44PM
(#32693600)
I would agree that you should always try to assume the best (and I didn't actually suggest he doesn't understand), but he certainly explains it clumsily, and his explanation does not illustrate the difference between a median and a mean, or when one would be more meaningful than the other.
Re:Not Your Grandmother's Textbook Exercise
by pkd on Saturday September 03, 2022 @10:31AM
(#32702213)
I don't think it's the best explanation, but I do think he understands that mean as a measure of central tendency is not that useful when distributions are skewed or multimodal (the squiggly line gesture).
Re:Not Your Grandmother's Textbook Exercise
by d1sxeyes on Sunday September 04, 2022 @03:46AM
(#32710816)
Yes but:
1. If data is multimodal (wiggly line), the median isn’t a great measure of central tendency either.
2. Perfectly normally distributed data will have the same mean and median.
I agree people have jumped on this as evidence the guy doesn’t understand when he probably does, but what he says is a long way from the truth.
HN's guidelines recommend to assume the best.