3 ms·
So basically the '3' comes entirely from the choice of a 95% confidence interval. If you want a 99% confidence interval it's instead the 'rule of 4.6', which do
by ajkjk 8y ago
So basically the '3' comes entirely from the choice of a 95% confidence interval. If you want a 99% confidence interval it's instead the 'rule of 4.6', which doesn't roll off the tongue as well.
- jedberg 8y agoYou could do the 'rule of 5' though and have a confidence of 99.3%, which is pretty close to 99.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- neolefty 8y agoIf you're truly estimating, though, wouldn't you use a 50% confidence interval — which gives you the rule of 1 (chances of the thing being true are 1/n — if you've seen 20 pages without a typo, chances are 1/20 that there's a typo on a page, with 50% confidence)?
- hawkice 8y agoSo, for a 50% confidence interval, you could look at the first word -- if it is a typo, boom, done. Otherwise, flip a coin. This stinks. Estimating is about approximating an answer with low information -- it's about efficiency of using data, not _only_ doing better than guessing.
- neolefty 8y agoSorry, I meant once you've examined n trials, what is your 50% confidence interval about the odds for a single trial? I think it would be 1/n.
- SamReidHughes 8y agoYes. That's a very reasonable choice.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]