This is not going to end well.

[cyrano]

After three hours in the math lab today I quit and went home, just about the time I discovered that even the tutors there couldn't tell me how to do this. I predict a more and more messy wrap up, with four weeks of the outer shell burning away, the conflagration constantly fed by the leaking hydrogen from within. Hopefully by the time I hit the ground most of the observers will have been able to clear the area. I'm trying to make an appointment to find out whether withdrawl is any better than failing at this late date, and if I have other options.
I cannot tell you when I use x, x-bar, mu, p, p-hat, z, z*, t, t* or any of the other variants let alone when I should take the value from a formula or a table or when degrees of freedom are important. And that statement probably made as much sense to you as it does to me, unless you're Jake.
Regardless. If I'd had my cigarettes with me, I would have been smoking. I'll have to settle for alcohol.

Comments

[jakejr.livejournal.com]

If you think I can help, we can talk on AIM anytime about whatever it is you're trying to do.

[cyranocyrano.livejournal.com]

The distance may be a barrier I can't overcome here. That combined with the fact that this instructor is very particular and wants to see things done in a very certain fashion.

[jakejr.livejournal.com]

Okay. Offer's open, so keep it in mind. And if you haven't looked at wikipedia (which is shockingly useful for math stuff) and the UCLA stats department (which has good tutorial videos and lectures and resources on a lot of topics), they might help, too. Usually the trouble with stats is just that the way they're being explained doesn't work for the individual. Everybody gets their head around it in a slightly different way, and most instructors can't find a way to do enough different explanations to help everyone.

[cyranocyrano.livejournal.com]

I will certainly have a look at these before I throw my hands up and walk away. Thank you very much.

[reluctantgenius.livejournal.com]

Haven't you left out sigma and N? I seem to remember those being important. Does it help to think of it as learning a new language?

[cyranocyrano.livejournal.com]

They're important, yes, but none of them are the baseline from which I build a graph.

[nuadha-prime.livejournal.com]

Let me try to tackle these as best I can:

x is the measurement value of a particular data point. It is used whenever you are referring to a measurement from a data point whether it is from the a sample or a population. It also used when counting success or failures for the number of successes in the sample.

X Bar is used when referring to the mean of a sample.

Mu is used when referring to the mean of a population.

Capital N is used for the number of data points (the size)for a poulation while lower case n is used for the number of data points in a sample.

P is used for probability. I have no idea why sometimes we use lower case p and sometimes we use upper case P. If you find out, let me know. I will try to remember to ask in my class on Wednesday.

p hat is used for a the percentage of "successes" in a sample proportion. For example if a sample of 15 is taken and 3 are "successes", then the p hat is 3/15. p hat = x/n.

Sigma is the standard deviation of a sample.


z is the data point on the standard normal distrubution to determine the probability for other normal distributions. Remember that the standard normal distribution has a mean of 0 and a standard deviation of 1.

Sadly, I have no idea what z* is supposed to be. That one is new to me and is not in my statistics text.

Unfortunatly, it looks like we are covering t this Wednesday, so I'm no help there.

[cyranocyrano.livejournal.com]

I think Sigma is the standard deviation of a population--they try to reserve Greek letters for a population and latin letters for samples. Which is why the capital P (which in my text is the Population level measure of proportion) is a theta in some texts, I am told.

One can understand why I might be a little confused.

[nuadha-prime.livejournal.com]

Our instructor warned us at the beginning of our class that the math lab will be little help with statistics since math majors often don't understand statistics and it is usually staffed by math majors.

[cyranocyrano.livejournal.com]

Alas, yes. There are four of the tutors who are tagged as 'can help with statistics'. Many of them, I get the impression that they feel uncomfortable doing so and would prefer if somebody else would handle it.
Megan, however, has been *amazing*. If I were allowed to tip the tutors, I totally would.