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Gissen en beslissen op statistische grondslag *
Author(s) -
Goudriaan J.
Publication year - 1963
Publication title -
statistica neerlandica
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.52
H-Index - 39
eISSN - 1467-9574
pISSN - 0039-0402
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-9574.1963.tb00319.x
Subject(s) - statistical analysis , social statistics , mathematical economics , mathematics , computer science , mathematics education , statistics
Summary Guessing and deciding on a statistical basis; a programm ‐ address to the general meeting of the Netherlands Statistical Society. There is always a deep and dangerous gap between pure mathematics and any application of mathematics to some part of reality. This danger is essential in the relatively new application of mathematical statistics to social sciences. ‘The observation of (nearly all) social phenomena is unique’ 1 ); they cannot be reproduced at will with sufficient accuracy; the recent and very valuable contributions to the theory of sampling are virtually useless in the social sciences. Therefore careful deductive analysis is a prerequisite for any successful statistical investigation in these fields. Some examples are given of erroneous statistical interpretations in business economics, social economics and related subjects especially from recent american publications and suggestions are made for improvement.