Re: Kerry's Improbable Medals

From: Ken Taylor (ken123_at_xtra.co.nz)
Date: 09/13/04 

Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 10:33:39 +1200

"Tom Seim" <soar2morrow@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:6c71b322.0409131140.25967242@posting.google.com...
> Tim Wescott <tim@wescottnospamdesign.com> wrote in message
news:<10kbcfi2v0k722d@corp.supernews.com>...
> > Tom Seim wrote:
> >
> > snip
> >
> > > Combat medal prob = 0.174 (17.4%)
> > > Five combat medal prob = 0.000159 (0.0159%)
> > >
> > snip
> > > Tom
> >
> > From 2e-9 to 1.6e-4. That's a jump.
> >
> > Not very consistent, are you?
>
> You have, clearly, not followed the reasoning:
>
> 1. combat medal prob (Pcm) = .174
> 2. five combat medal prob (Pcm5) = Pcm^5 = 1.59e-4
> 3. silver star prob (Pss) = number recipients / number of vietnam
> combatents
> = 21630 / 2594000 = .00834
> 4. bronze medal prob (Pbm) = 170621 / 2594000 = .068
> 5. purple heart prob (Pph) = 220516 / 2594000 = .085
> 6. three purple heart prob (Pph3) = Pph^3 = .000614
> 7. silver star + bronze star + 3 purple hearts (Psbp3) = Pss * Pbm *
> Pph3 = 3.37e-7
> 8. Kerry's combat period = 132 days (including training)
> 9. Ratio of Kerry's service to average service (Pkr) = 132 / 365 =
> 0.362
> 10. Kerry's medal probability = Pkr^5 * Psbp3 = 3.37e-7 * 0.362^5 =
> 2.08e-9.
> 11. Inverted = 479,772,337 : 1
> 12. Number of Vietnam wars for this to occur = 479,772,337 /
> 2,594,000 = 185
>
> Note that the probability of five combat medals (Pcm5) is not used in
> Kerry's probability calculation AT ALL! It is just another factoid.
>
> Tom

Okay, you're a dumb-arse who knows nothing about statistics other than they
are numbers. Each medal is not an isolated incident statistically, as it is
dependant on the person involved. You can't just blindly add up the numbers
and get a result - it's meaningless, mindless and stupid. If you compared
his medal tally to that of a similar rank person who had a similar posting
record, it may make more sense, but not necessarily.

Ken

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