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Comment author:Romashka
17 October 2016 07:33:22AM
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At least in the boat problem one can give an interval estimate:)
Seriously, though, this is interesting stuff. I thought about writing a post on 'different assumptions' like this, like when you have explained to a student how to calculate the molecular mass of a compound, show them the very rudiments of mass spectrometry theory and watch them try to reconcile the idea of a structured molecule (or whatever it is called in salts) with the idea of just totalling the nuclons and dividing by the charge. I had problems with it when I had to read about it.
Or there's another case of diatoms' shells inheritance, compared to Mendelian genetics.
If anyone has an idea of another 'similar-but-not-similar' pair of problems, please let me/us know.
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Comments (12)
I wonder how my coworkers will do...
EDIT (2016.10.21): In case anybody is interested, the results with my coworkers are...
6 variations of "I don't know" with one outright "You didn't give me any information about the shepherd... he could be any age"
4 numeric answers ranging from 5 to 35
1 got distracted and never answered the question
I've got a party to attend tomorrow, we'll see if they do better.
At least in the boat problem one can give an interval estimate:)
Seriously, though, this is interesting stuff. I thought about writing a post on 'different assumptions' like this, like when you have explained to a student how to calculate the molecular mass of a compound, show them the very rudiments of mass spectrometry theory and watch them try to reconcile the idea of a structured molecule (or whatever it is called in salts) with the idea of just totalling the nuclons and dividing by the charge. I had problems with it when I had to read about it.
Or there's another case of diatoms' shells inheritance, compared to Mendelian genetics.
If anyone has an idea of another 'similar-but-not-similar' pair of problems, please let me/us know.