Statisticians

Worries While Flying

Two statisticians were travelling in an airplane from LA to New York. About an hour into the flight, the pilot announced that they had lost an engine, but don't worry, there are three left.

However, instead of 5 hours it would take 7 hours to get to New York. A little later, he announced that a second engine failed, and they still had two left, but it would take 10 hours to get to New York.

Somewhat later, the pilot again came on the intercom and announced that a third engine had died. Never fear, he announced, because the plane could fly on a single engine.

However, it would now take 18 hours to get to new York. At this point, one statistician turned to the other and said, "Gee, I hope we don't lose that last engine, or we'll be up here forever!"

Risk Of Plane Bombs

A mathematician and a non-mathematician are sitting in an airport hall waiting for their flight to go. The non has terrible flight panic.

"Hey, don't worry, it's just every 10000th flight that crashes."

"1:10000? So much? Then it surely will be mine!"

"Well, there is an easy way out. Simply take the next plane. It's much more probable that you go from a crashing to a non-crashing plane than the other way round. So you are already at 1:10000 squared."

Reducing Travel Risk

There was this statistics student who, when driving his car, would always accelerate hard before coming to any junction, whizz straight over it, then slow down again once he'd got over it.

One day, he took a passenger, who was understandably unnerved by his driving style, and asked him why he went so fast over junctions.

The statistics student replied, "Well, statistically speaking, you are far more likely to have an accident at a junction, so I just make sure that I spend less time there."

(Courtesy of forwarded mail from C K Cheong)