Statistical relics

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Submitted by david on Thu, 01/20/2011 - 11:11

The bunting was out on Tuesday for the celebrations of the 100th anniversary of the first statistics department in the world at University College London! UCL was home to the great developments in statistics both before and after the department opened in 1911, with Karl Pearson as Professor of Applied Statistics, endowed by Francis Galton who had just died.

Correlation, regression, t-tests, hypothesis testing: all were developed at UCL. The whole collection of methods that some of us think are wonderful, but have also been the cause of boundless exasperation in unwilling students.

At the celebrations they handed out official photos of past students: below are two of the Understanding Uncertainty bloggers as they appeared in 1974. Spot the change.


David Spiegelhalter and Kevin McConway in their prime in 1974

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Anonymous (not verified)

Thu, 01/20/2011 - 16:37

I think you'll find the guy on the left is Georgie Best.
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Anonymous (not verified)

Fri, 01/21/2011 - 11:12

Weren't you both lovely in your prime!! Jenny
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Anonymous (not verified)

Fri, 01/28/2011 - 10:25

Interesting that J J Sylvester studied maths (under DeMorgan) at UCL about 80 years before the stats dept was established. JJ Sylvester contributed important ideas on matrix theory and combinatorics; both of which are important today in statistics. Furthermore he taught Florence Nightingale maths (and presumably statistics) when he served at Woolwich Academy. Peter Jackson