7.2 What Is Data Mining?
We have already considered ways that statistical techniques can help us process and summarize large amounts of data. By computing statistical measures such as the range, mean, standard deviation, and frequency, we can begin to make statements about our data. In this chapter we will explore this idea further.
Large amounts of data can be overwhelming. Yet, it is likely that important pieces of information are hidden away within the data that may not be obvious when only simple types of descriptive statistics are used. In this kind of situation, we can use data mining—the application of automated techniques that attempt to discover underlying patterns. These techniques can be applied to any number of data domains. For ...
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