One of the earliest forms of inferential statistics comes from ancient india. th

Question

One of the earliest forms of inferential statistics comes from ancient india. the mahabharata states that king Rituparna showed his masterful mathematical skill to his traveling companion by estimating the number of leaves and fruit on two great branches of a spreading tree. he estimates there are 2095 fruit on the branches by examing a single twig. his traveling companion counts the fruit on the tree all night and finds his estimate was accurate.

A) how does this story relate to inferential statistics? be explicit on what is the sample, the population, and the inference.

b) what might be a flaw in his method?

Explanation / Answer

a) Inferential statistics is used to make inferences about the entire population by using the data drawn from the sample.

Sample: Sample is a small subset of a larger set of data (i.e. population). The probability of characteristics of population is determined from the characteristics of the sample.

In the given question, the problem was to estimate the number of fruits on two great branches of a spreading tree. So, here the population can be taken as the two great branches.

This estimation is to be done on the basis of a sample. It is said that Rituparna estimated that there are 2095 fruits on the branches by examining a single twig. A twig is a small part of the branch. The estimation of the population was done with the help of the data collected from this single twig. So, here the sample is the single twig which was chosen.

The estimation drawn is the inference. So here, the inference is to estimate that the number of fruits on the branches are 2095.

b) The sample selected should be random and unbiased. If not, the prediction might not be accurate. This leads to wrong results. So, there might be a flaw in this method of predicting the characteristics of the entire population if the selection of the sample is not random.

In the situation of the given question, the twig which was chosen might contain more number of fruits or less number of fruits than the average number of fruits which might be present on the two great branches. So this might lead to huge difference in the actual estimation.

Every member of the population has an equal chance of being selected into the sample. The selection of one member is independent from the selection of another member. Thus, it is selection by pure chance. So, this is a flaw in this method.

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