Admittedly real life wasn’t like that. But only, they argued, because we didn’t have enough data to be certain.Then the cracks began to appear. It proved impossible to predict exactly how three planets orbiting each other would move. Meteorologists discovered that the weather was truly chaotic – so dependent on small variations that it could never be predicted for more than a few days out. And the final nail in the coffin was quantum theory, showing that everything in the universe has probability at its heart.That gives human beings a problem. We understand the world through patterns. Randomness and probability will always be alien to us. But it’s time to plunge into this fascinating, shadowy world, because randomness crops up everywhere. Probability and statistics are the only way to get a grip on nature’s workings. They may even seal the fate of free will and predict how the universe will end.Forget Newton’s clockwork universe. Welcome to Dice World.

    Major retailers are predicting everything from when their customers are pregnant to when they want a new pair of Chuck Taylors. It's a brave new world where seemingly meaningless data can be transformed into valuable insight to drive smart business decisions.But how does one exactly do data science? Do you have to hire one of these priests of the dark arts, the "data scientist," to extract this gold from your data? Nope.Data science is little more than using straight-forward steps to process raw data into actionable insight. And in Data Smart, author and data scientist John Foreman will show you how that's done within the familiar environment of a spreadsheet. Why a spreadsheet? It's comfortable! You get to look at the data every step of the way, building confidence as you learn the tricks of the trade. Plus, spreadsheets are a vendor-neutral place to learn data science without the hype. But don't let the Excel sheets fool you. This is a book for those serious about learning the analytic techniques, the math and the magic, behind big data.Each chapter will cover a different technique in a spreadsheet so you can follow along: - Mathematical optimization, including non-linear programming and genetic algorithms- Clustering via k-means, spherical k-means, and graph modularity- Data mining in graphs, such as outlier detection- Supervised AI through logistic regression, ensemble models, and bag-of-words models- Forecasting, seasonal adjustments, and prediction intervals through monte carlo simulation- Moving from spreadsheets into the R programming languageYou get your hands dirty as you work alongside John through each technique. But never fear, the topics are readily applicable and the author laces humor throughout. You'll even learn what a dead squirrel has to do with optimization modeling, which you no doubt are dying to know.

    But all too often, these numbers are wrong. This book is a lively guide to spotting bad statistics and learning to think critically about these influential numbers. Damned Lies and Statistics is essential reading for everyone who reads or listens to the news, for students, and for anyone who relies on statistical information to understand social problems.Joel Best bases his discussion on a wide assortment of intriguing contemporary issues that have garnered much recent media attention, including abortion, cyberporn, homelessness, the Million Man March, teen suicide, the U.S. census, and much more. Using examples from the New York Times, the Washington Post, and other major newspapers and television programs, he unravels many fascinating examples of the use, misuse, and abuse of statistical information.In this book Best shows us exactly how and why bad statistics emerge, spread, and come to shape policy debates. He recommends specific ways to detect bad statistics, and shows how to think more critically about "stat wars," or disputes over social statistics among various experts. Understanding this book does not require sophisticated mathematical knowledge; Best discusses the most basic and most easily understood forms of statistics, such as percentages, averages, and rates.This accessible book provides an alternative to either naively accepting the statistics we hear or cynically assuming that all numbers are meaningless. It shows how anyone can become a more intelligent, critical, and empowered consumer of the statistics that inundate both the social sciences and our media-saturated lives.

    Communication is also emphasized, with a focus on how to document and communicate project developments, both within and outside of the team. In-depth coverage of planning, scheduling and cost management is also provided. The authors' goal is to provide many cases that are fun and elicit interesting debates, and this edition includes new end-of-chapter cases. In addition, all new up-to-date Real World Project Management vignettes are included at the beginning and within each chapter, giving you a taste of how project management is practically applied in the workplace. Key points of each chapter are highlighted in Critical Success Factor boxes, providing an overview of the main ideas covered within the chapter. End-of-chapter materials contain questions and Internet exercises that allow you to apply the concepts covered in the chapter. Sprinkled throughout each chapter are boxed questions designed to test your comprehension of key concepts. A trial version of Microsoft Office Project 2007 is included for student use on class projects.

    While such visualizations can better inform us, they can also deceive by displaying incomplete or inaccurate data, suggesting misleading patterns—or simply misinform us by being poorly designed, such as the confusing “eye of the storm” maps shown on TV every hurricane season.Many of us are ill equipped to interpret the visuals that politicians, journalists, advertisers, and even employers present each day, enabling bad actors to easily manipulate visuals to promote their own agendas. Public conversations are increasingly driven by numbers, and to make sense of them we must be able to decode and use visual information. By examining contemporary examples ranging from election-result infographics to global GDP maps and box-office record charts, How Charts Lie teaches us how to do just that.

    This text is highly regarded because of its engaging and understandable introduction to statistics. The author's commitment to providing student-friendly guidance through the material and giving students opportunities to apply their newly learned skills in a real-world context has made Elementary Statistics the #1 best-seller in the market.

    The book has the hallmark features for which Lippincott's Illustrated Reviews volumes are so popular: an outline format, over 600 full-color illustrations, end-of-chapter summaries, review questions, plus an entire section of clinical case studies with full-color illustrations. This edition's medical/clinical focus has been sharpened to provide a high-yield review. Five additional case studies have been included, bringing the total to nineteen. Review questions have been reformatted to comply with USMLE Step 1 style, with clinical vignettes.

    While the mathematics is there, the effort is not all concentrated on proofs. Strang's emphasis is on understanding. He explains concepts, rather than deduces. This book is written in an informal and personal style and teaches real mathematics. The gears change in Chapter 2 as students reach the introduction of vector spaces. Throughout the book, the theory is motivated and reinforced by genuine applications, allowing pure mathematicians to teach applied mathematics.

    Organized around a strategic marketing framework"Services Marketing" guides readers into the consumer and competitive environments in services marketing. The marketing framework has been restructured for this edition to reflect what is happening in services marketing today.

    It shows teachers how to create an environment in which technology can effectively enhance learning. It contains a technology integration framework that builds on research and the TIP model.

    This Contracts primer is vastly uncluttered - one that picks up the main themes in the first-year Contracts course, together with related cases.

    The complexity of nature's shapes differs in kind, not merely degree, from that of the shapes of ordinary geometry, the geometry of fractal shapes.Now that the field has expanded greatly with many active researchers, Mandelbrot presents the definitive overview of the origins of his ideas and their new applications. The Fractal Geometry of Nature is based on his highly acclaimed earlier work, but has much broader and deeper coverage and more extensive illustrations.

    It reveals the attraction that has drawn leading mathematicians and amateurs alike to number theory over the course of history.

    Capturing the tone of students exchanging ideas among themselves, this unique guide also explains how calculus is taught, how to get the best teachers, what to study, and what is likely to be on exams—all the tricks of the trade that will make learning the material of first-semester calculus a piece of cake. Funny, irreverent, and flexible, How to Ace Calculus shows why learning calculus can be not only a mind-expanding experience but also fantastic fun.

    Froeb/McCann's MANAGERIAL ECONOMICS: A PROBLEM SOLVING APPROACH, 2E covers traditional material using a problem-based pedagogy built around common business mistakes. Models are used sparingly, and then only to the extent that they help students figure out why mistakes are made, and how to fix them. This edition's succinct, fast-paced presentation and challenging, interactive applications place students in the role of a decision maker who has to identify mistakes that reduce profits, and propose solutions to bring profits back up. The lively book provides an excellent ongoing reference for students pursuing business careers. New chapters and updates highlight mistakes that precipitated the financial crisis. With MANAGERIAL ECONOMICS, 2E your students are taught to use economics to not only identify profitable decisions, but also how to implement them within an organization.