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        riddles >> hard >> Statistics & Rockstars
        
(Message started by: pa0pa0 on Jul 27^th, 2002, 2:14am)

Title: Statistics & Rockstars
Post by pa0pa0 on Jul 27^th, 2002, 2:14am

>The religious keeper of the web page The Premature Death of Rockstars argues that rock stars do not live as long as the general population. He states that the average age at death of rock stars is 36.9

... if the issue here is what I'm thinking it is, then as time rolls by it would probably be a good idea to change the example - maybe the average mortality of website designers would do for now.

Title: Re: Statistics & Rockstars
Post by TheBean on Jul 28^th, 2002, 11:40pm

I presume the flaw in the logic is...

The average age of dead americans is based on a sample of people who have all died, but the average age of dead rock stars is based on a population that have not all died.

The same effect is observed if you look at your life expectancy. When you are young, your life expectancy is low, because some people will die young. As you age, your life expectancy increases, because most people who have died young have already done so, and are no longer a part of the population that is measured to determine your life expectancy.

Title: Re: Statistics & Rockstars
Post by Psychotic Venom on Aug 7^th, 2002, 3:04pm

Actually, the flaw in logic is this:

The vast majority of Rock stars are young. After they quit the business when they are older, they are no longer Rock Stars. Thus, the average age of people in the "Rock Star" business ends around 30 or so (let's pretend), but the average age of people in the human race ends whenever the average age of death is.

The Rock Star sample is simply a sub-set of the human race that can be exited from. The human race can ONLY be exited from through death.

--Mark

Title: Re: Statistics & Rockstars
Post by Kozo Morimoto on Aug 7^th, 2002, 4:36pm

Is this like saying the average age at the death of students is 10? (if you start at 6 and graduate high school at 17, middle of would be around 10)

Title: Re: Statistics & Rockstars
Post by Justin_Bailey on Aug 8^th, 2002, 5:44am

Actually, there's already a thread about this, I don't feel like typing it all again, so you can read my reply here :)

http://www.ocf.berkeley.edu/~wwu/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.cgi?board=riddles_hard;action=display;num=1027989585

Title: Re: Statistics & Rockstars
Post by James Fingas on Aug 29^th, 2002, 12:36pm

Another problem with it: How old is Rock music? If we haven't had time for the original rock stars to get old, then the only ones who have died are the ones who died young.

Of course, most of them ODed on purpose after realizing that dying was the only way to avoid old age...

TheBean,
It doesn't neccessarily matter that not all rock stars are dead--not all americans are dead either. If they all were dead (rock stars), then we could get the actual mean, rather than the sample mean!