The Lady Tasting Tea
How Statistics Revolutionized Science in the Twentieth Century
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5.0 • 2 Ratings
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- $12.99
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
"A fascinating description of the kinds of people who interacted, collaborated, disagreed, and were brilliant in the development of statistics." —Barbara A. Bailar, Senior Vice-President, National Opinion Research Center
At a summer tea party in Cambridge, England, a guest states that tea poured into milk tastes different from milk poured into tea. Her notion is shouted down by the scientific minds of the group. But one man, Ronald Fisher, proposes to scientifically test the hypothesis. There is no better person to conduct such an experiment, for Fisher is a pioneer in the field of statistics.
The Lady Tasting Tea spotlights not only Fisher's theories but also the revolutionary ideas of dozens of men and women which affect our modern everyday lives. Writing with verve and wit, David Salsburg traces breakthroughs ranging from the rise and fall of Karl Pearson's theories to the methods of quality control that rebuilt postwar Japan's economy, including a pivotal early study on the capacity of a small beer cask at the Guinness brewing factory.
Brimming with intriguing tidbits and colorful characters, The Lady Tasting Tea salutes the spirit of those who dared to look at the world in a new way.
"Highly readable and well-written. Give it to someone you want to delight." —Alcan R. Feinstein, M.D., Sterling Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology, Yale University School of Medicine
Customer Reviews
Delightful, seriously!
What a fantastic tour of how the field of statistics emerged and developed. David Salzburg writes about the people and the times in which the methods developed and makes an extremely technical topic approachable, fascinating, and a pleasure to read. If you always hated statistics, read this book. Salzburg manages to explain the gist of the different methods and why/ how they matter to a lay audience without sounding condescending or boring. If you have done any advanced studies (in almost any subject) many of the names that pop up will be very familiar to you, and it is delightful to learn about the people that named the methods and find the connections between them across chapters and time.