Statistical artefacts

A statistical artefact is (in one sense of the word) ‘any object used by humans for statistical purposes’. This chapter investigates some common and some unusual statistical artefacts. The most common is, surely, the human hand, which has never ceased being a means for counting. More unusual are the quipu, a tool for keeping statistical records, and the quincunx, a device for physically demonstrating a symmetric binomial distribution. Among more complex statistical artefacts, computers of every kind are certainly the most ubiquitous. A second sense of the word artefact is ‘a spurious result in a scientific experiment, especially one created by the experimental procedure itself’. Two kinds of statistical artefacts of this kind are presented, with examples.