Statistics Hacks
by Bruce Frey

The unconfirmed error reports are from readers.  They have not yet been 
approved or disproved by the author or editor and represent solely the
opinion of the reader.

Here's a key to the markup:
        [page-number]: serious technical mistake
        {page-number}: minor technical mistake
        <page-number>: important language/formatting problem
        (page-number): language change or minor formatting problem
        ?page-number?: reader question or request for clarification

This page was updated June 25, 2008.


UNCONFIRMED  errors and comments from readers: 


[5]  5th paragraph;
"if you add up those distances, you get a total that is as small as possible"

Counter example 0, 3 and 3 whose mean is two and total distance of all points is 4.
The total distance from point 3 is 3


(176) hack #41;
This isn't so much an erratum as an omission. The analysis is fine so far as it goes, but it leaves out that if you lose you are out the money you paid, but if you win you only keep about 60% of the prize money since 40% goes to federal and state income taxes. That lowers the odds of winning by another 40% from the analysis in your hack #41 and makes lotteries a real fraud.


{272}  Displayed equation in the middle of the page;
In the summation you use the symbol "k", but you never explain what "k" is.


[285] 5th paragraph (formula) - about 2/3s of the way down the page;
The formula for the "Number of Possible Winning Combinations =" should be:

n!/k!(n - k)!

The book has k! in the numerator