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Re: what good is "percentage error"?





On Wed, 14 May 1997, Rauber, Joel Phys wrote:

It appears that we are talking apples and oranges here. My point has
been that we cannot replace proper accuracy estimates (a more positive
term than "error analysis")

"Accuracy estimation" is a good and descriptive term, though not supported
in the literature. Have you ever seen a book titled "Accuracy Estimation"?
There are plenty of books titled "Error Analysis" or "Uncertainty
Analysis", however. And that's a perfectly good descriptive term, for
"error" and "uncertainty" are synonyms in this field, and "analysis"
means "calculation of" in mathematics.

So, until the folks who write the books and journal articles decide to
change the name of this branch of mathematics, I think we should stick
with accepted terminology. Do you suppose we should change the name of
calculus books to "Theory and Techniques of Differentiation and
Integration"? BTW, the mathematical discipline of calculus used to be
called "Analysis" and many of the best upper level books (and courses)
still carry that name.

There seems to be a propensity in some teachers to invent new technical
language where well-established language is available. We have enough
technical terms already! The small concern I have is that (1) Things
learned early seem hardest to change later (if the student should take
college courses which are more fussy about using standard language) and
(2) Students may have no exposure at all to the conventions, technical
language and terms of the field.

-- Donald