Home
Benford's Law
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Ideas & Questions
- Hits: 1813
Listening to Radiolab, much fodder for the imagination. Like Benford's Law. For those not familiar, it basically states that "in lists of numbers from many (but not all) real-life sources of data, the leading digit is distributed in a specific, non-uniform way. According to this law, the first digit is 1 almost one third of the time, and larger digits occur as the leading digit with lower and lower frequency, to the point where 9 as a first digit occurs less than one time in twenty. This distribution of first digits arises logically whenever a set of values is distributed logarithmically."
Or, more precisely: "Benford's law states that the leading digit d (d ∈ {1, …, b − 1} ) in base b (b ≥ 2) occurs with probability:"
Source: Wikipedia
Now this is intriguing. It can be explained to some extent and in some instances by mechanisms of growth (eg: fibonocci sequence), or in other word most systems & organisms "grow" and so when measured exhibit typical growth patterns (eg: cities - addresses grow out from center, hence disproportionate number of addresses beginning with a 1..). But note the qualifier - that to some extent and in some instances. There are apparently as well instances of data that conform to Bedford's law yet in no ways could be considered "alive" or "organic". Which is curious.
And, to add to the curiosity, in the same program (radiolab, numbers), the point is raised that while the recognition of numbers is an ability we are all born with, it's not the observation of linear numbers and quantity as we know it, rather instead a logarithmic means of counting - meaning that a child will recognize double and quadruple amounts more readily and primitive tribes who have not developed the same perspective we have, if asked to choose the midway point between 1 and 9, for example, would choose 3, whereas we - by training and force of habit - would choose 5.
Which is very curious indeed. I've explained it poorly, but listen to the radiolab program to hear it explained more in depth and in a much more interesting fashion...
Radiolab
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Audio & Podcasts
- Hits: 1691
Nothing new, an old favorite rediscovered is all, formerly lost in the 1000's of bookmarks that are my organizational skills....
WNYC.org - Public Radio, Listen Here: http://www.wnyc.org/shows/radiolab/
Plays, Chinese boy, living north of Texas
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Dreams
- Hits: 1878
I've had a wealth of strange dreams lately. I put it down to stress. And while I won't write these down in their entirety, here is a brief sampling.....
There's a Chinese boy, maybe 7, he's over in America on a scholarship, hiding in a now defunct radio telescope array, I see him, his family, shadows flitting about the unused equipment, he's a prodigy, there are other people living down here, some are more legal than others, and his story is that he was a prodigy, brought over when NASA was still thriving, now, with NASA defunct, they're living here....
Or I'm on my way to see a play, Orpheus and Euridyce's at the Grand, and I've caught a bus in from out of town...It drops me off in an old neighborhood not far from the theater, I think, and so I begin to make my way towards the play....I pass somewhere I used to live, counting the street numbers, it's getting later and later and I realize that I'm not going to make the play....
There's a building and I'm inside, it's a poetry reading, famous local lawyer is reading, he's tall, thin, good looking with shock of dark hair, those fashionable thick dark rimmed glasses and a peculiar overbite that sees his top row of teeth extend an inch above his bottom. He's a lawyer but he'd really rather be a poet, the lawyer business is just something he does to pass the time... I've somehow volunteered with this play, and so go along with a coterie of volunteers to the theatre to see a pre-screening. It's in his law offices, there's a stage below and 1 floor up, perched precariously on the edge without room to move are the seats...I get vertigo finding mine, looking down at the stage, feels as if one could fall at any moment, and there's no guardrail to protect you.
It's a modern dance number, the dream passes, we help the dancers with their blocking, the view from above looks through a cross-shaped cut in the floor. He tells my my role as volunteer, I'm to hold up a sign on the Whitemud freeway in Edmonton that tells traffic how to get here....
I think this is absolutely useless, I've missed my play, Orpheus and Eurydice, but he's very persuasive and charming, and now begins to tell me about how the law firm he works for has hidden a cashbox full of money in a corner of the law office, buried right in the concrete, and maybe there's room for a bright young man such as myself to be his intern, we could split the proceeds....
I'm living somewhere north of Texas with a woman and her child...my daughter is there, we're only 3 hours from the Gulf of Mexico, the ex swings by to tell me it's OK, she doesn't mind living here, it's strange, the house is dark, like a woodsy log-cabin, something isn't right and I keep thinking that the Gulf of Mexico is only 3 hours from here....
***
All in all a strange assortment, a rather unbroken streak of half-remembered, disquieting dreams...
New Landlord....
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Miscellany
- Hits: 2112
The house has sold, and is now in the hands of the new owners.
Which is the cause of some stress.
Mainly because the last owner was enormously patient with my varied rent schedule.
The new owners I don't think will be so kind.
But they've owned the house now for 2 days, and have not yet swung 'round to enquire about the rent.
That could be a good thing. Or not.
It isn't there. There are cheques outstanding, as always, but the rent, the rent and damage deposit they're probably expecting, it isn't there.
It's a warning sign that the freelancing thing isn't quite working out, and so I've made up my mind to move back into the world of paid labour.
Not an easy or light decision, but in light of the past year a long overdue one.
So, if the blog posts are a little slender, or less than your expecting, this is why. Until I've some sort of confirmed, regular employment I'll be investing my energies in other directions. But I'll resume this, hopefully in a sunnier vein, in the very near future....
Page 822 of 881