Re: Central Limit Theorem

[brian whatcott <inet@INTELLISYS.NET>]

At 11:15 12/18/99 -0500, you wrote:
> Where is a connection between the corn pop sound and the
> central limit theorem? The intensity distribution (of single pops)
> may or may not be gaussian. But if the grains were popping
> together, for example, never less than at least five, then the
> distribution of intensities (of non overlapping explosions)
> would be gaussian. Is this what you were trying to say?
>
> "Carl C. Gaither" wrote:
>
> > ... I came across this quotation by William A. Massey and
> > thought it might be enjoyed and useful.
>
> > "When you are listening to corn pop, are you hearing the
> > Central Limit Theorem?"


Let us suppose that Carl drew our attention to the varying
intensity of a time series of sound from popping corn, where Massey
 had in mind the distribution in time to pop of randomly chosen
kernels.

The Central limit theorem has some easy requirements.
 The population variables of interest are independent and random.
 They all exhibit the same distribution function.

 In the case of corn it might be a skew function: time to pop
 never less than zero, but t can be very long.


 But there is a second more practical constraint in this case:
the distribution - no matter how skew must be finite.

   And this is a fly in the popcorn.

When I attempt to pop corn, there is always some residue of
kernels which have not and will not pop. so for them
t =  infinite








brian whatcott <inet@intellisys.net>
Altus OK