Founders of statistics
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Statistics is the theory and application of mathematics to the scientific method including hypothesis generation, experimental design, sampling, data collection, data summarization, estimation, prediction and inference from those results to the population from which the experimental sample was drawn. This article lists statisticians who have been instrumental in the development of theoretical and applied statistics.
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[edit] Founders of statistics
- Thomas Bayes (English, 1702–1761)
- Developed the interpretation of probability now known as Bayes theorem[1]
- Carl Friedrich Gauss (German, 1777–1855)
- Invented least squares estimation methods
- Adolphe Quetelet (Belgian, 1796–1874)
- Pioneered the use of probability and statistics in the social sciences
- Florence Nightingale (English, 1820–1910)
- Applied statistical analysis to health problems, contributing to the establishment of epidemiology and public health practice. First female member of the Royal Statistical Society.
- Francis Galton (English, 1822–1911)
- Invented the concepts of standard deviation, correlation, regression[2][3]
- Karl Pearson (English, 1857–1936)
- Numerous innovations, including the development of the Pearson chi-squared test and the Pearson correlation[4][5][6][7]
- Charles Spearman (English, 1863–1945)
- Extended the Pearson correlation coefficient to the Spearman's rank correlation coefficient[8]
- William Sealy Gosset (known as "Student") (English, 1876–1937)
- Discovered the Student t distribution and invented the Student's t-test[9]
- Waloddi Weibull (Swedish, 1887–1979)
- Developed the Weibull distribution
- Ronald A. Fisher (English, 1890–1962)
- Invented the analysis of variance,[10][11][12] introduced the method of maximum likelihood, the concept of sufficient statistics, Fisher information, and many theoretical concepts now a standard part of the basic curriculum
- Carlo Emilio Bonferroni (Italian, 1892–1960)
- Invented the Bonferroni correction for multiple comparisons
- Frank Wilcoxon (Irish, American, 1892–1965)
- Invented two statistical tests: Wilcoxon rank-sum test and the Wilcoxon signed-rank test
- Jerzy Neyman (Polish, American, 1894–1981)
- Discovered the confidence interval and co-developed the Neyman-Pearson lemma[13]
- W. Edwards Deming (American, 1900–1993)
- Developed methods for statistical quality control[14]
- Egon Pearson (English, 1895–1980)
- Co-developed the Neyman-Pearson lemma of statistical hypothesis testing[15]
- Maurice Kendall (English, 1907–1983)
- Co-developed methods for assessing statistical randomness; invented Kendall tau rank correlation coefficient
- John Wilder Tukey (American, 1915–2000)
- Jointly popularized Fast Fourier transformation, pioneer of exploratory data analysis and graphical presentation of data, developed the jackknife for variance estimation, invented the box plot.[16]
- Calyampudi Radhakrishna Rao (Indian, 1920–)
- Co-developed Cramér-Rao bound and Rao-Blackwell theorem, invented MINQUE method of variance component estimation.[17][18]
- David Cox (English, 1924–)
- Developed the proportional hazards model for the analysis of survival data[19]
- Bradley Efron (American, 1938–)
- Invented the bootstrap resampling technique for deriving an empirical distribution of an estimate of a model parameter[20]
[edit] Founders of Departments of Statistics
| Year | University | Founder |
|---|---|---|
| 1911 | University College London | Karl Pearson[5] |
| ~1931 | Columbia University | Harold Hotelling[21] |
| 1933 | Iowa State University | George W. Snedecor[22] |
| 1941 | North Carolina State University | Gertrude Cox[23] |
| 1947 | University of Manchester | M. S. Bartlett[24][25] |
| 1947 | Department of Biometry and Statistics, Cornell University | Walter T. Federer[26] |
| 1948 | Stanford University | -[27] |
| 1949 | University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill | -[28] |
| 1949 | University of Chicago | -[29] |
| 1953 | Cambridge University, Statistics Lab | John Wishart[30] |
| 1955 | University of California, Berkeley | Jerzy Neyman[31] |
| 1957 | Harvard University | W. G. Cochran[32] Frederick Mosteller[33] |
| 1957 | University of Sydney | H.O. Lancaster[34] |
| 1962 | Texas A&M University | Herman Otto Hartley[35] |
| 1963 | Yale University | Francis Anscombe[36][37] |
| 1965 | Princeton University | John W Tukey[38][39] |
| 1966 | University of Glasgow | John Aitchison, David Silvey[40] |
| 1979 | University of Toronto | -[41] |
| 1988 | University of Oxford | D. V. Hinkley[42] |
[edit] See also
- List of statisticians
- History of statistics
- Timeline of probability and statistics
- Fathers of scientific fields
[edit] References
- ^ "Thomas Bayes". Figures from the History of Probability and Statistics. University of Southampton.
- ^ "Francis Galton". Figures from the History of Probability and Statistics. University of Southampton.
- ^ "Sir Francis Galton F.R.S: 1822–1911".
- ^ "Pearson, Karl". Statisticians in History. American Statistical Association.
- ^ a b "Karl Pearson (1857-1936)". Department of Statistical Science - University College London.
- ^ "Karl Pearson". School of Mathematics and Statistics, University of St Andrews (2003).
- ^ John Aldrich (2008). "Karl Pearson: A Reader’s Guide". University of Southampton.
- ^ Williams, RH, Zimmerman, DW, Zumbo, BD & Ross, D (2003). "Charles Spearman: British Behavioral Scientist". Human Nature Review. 3: 114–118. http://human-nature.com/nibbs/03/spearman.html.
- ^ "William Sealy Gosset". Figures from the History of Probability and Statistics. University of Southampton.
- ^ "Fisher, R.A.". Statisticians in History. American Statistical Association.
- ^ "R.A. Fisher". Figures from the History of Probability and Statistics. University of Southampton.
- ^ "A Guide to R. A. Fisher".
- ^ "Neyman, Jerzy". Statisticians in History. American Statistical Association.
- ^ "Deming, W. Edwards". Statisticians in History. American Statistical Association.
- ^ "Pearson, Egon S.". Statisticians in History. American Statistical Association.
- ^ Mccullagh, Peter (2003). "John Wilder Tukey. 16 June 1915 - 26 July 2000" (pdf). Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society (1955-2000) 49: 537. doi:. http://journals.royalsociety.org/content/541x625k2vx6837v/fulltext.pdf.
- ^ Degroot, Morris H. (1987). "A Conversation with C. R. Rao". Statistical Science 2: 53. doi:.
- ^ Rao, Calyampudi R, American Statistical Association, http://www.amstat.org/about/statisticians/index.cfm?fuseaction=biosinfo&BioID=13
- ^ Wermuth, Nanny; Anthony C. Davison; Dodge, Yadolah (2005). Celebrating Statistics: Papers in honour of Sir David Cox on his 80th birthday (Oxford Statistical Science Series). Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-856654-9. OCLC 185035518.
- ^ Casella, George (2003). "Introduction to the Silver Anniversary of the Bootstrap". Statistical Science 18: 133. doi:.
- ^ Hotelling, Harold, American Statistical Association Statisticians in History, http://www.amstat.org/about/statisticians/index.cfm?fuseaction=biosinfo&BioID=7
- ^ Kempthorne O. (1974). "George W. Snedecor". International Statistical Review 42: 319–321.
- ^ "Cox, Gertrude M.". Statisticians in History. American Statistical Association.
- ^ This position was the second chair of mathematical statistics in the United Kingdom, but there was no formal Department of Statistics at the University of Manchester.
- ^ Peter Whittle (2004), "Maurice Stevenson Bartlett. 18 June 1910 - 8 January 2002" (pdf), Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society 50: 15–33, doi:, http://journals.royalsociety.org/content/m74446503k81l08q/fulltext.pdf
- ^ "Department of Biological Statistics and Computational Biology: History". Cornell University.
- ^ Stephen M. Stigler (1999). "The Foundations of Statistics at Stanford". The American Statistician 53.
- ^ UNC School of Public Health - School history, 2008, http://www.sph.unc.edu/school/school_history.html
- ^ Stephen M. Stigler ([dead link] – Scholar search), About the Department of Statistics, University of Chicago, http://www.stat.uchicago.edu/dept/about.html
- ^ Peter Whittle (2003), A Realised Path: The Cambridge Statistical Laboratory, http://www.statslab.cam.ac.uk/History/2history.html
- ^ E. L. Lehmann (1996), "The Creation and Early History of the Berkeley Statistics Department" (pdf), Statistics, Probability and Game Theory 30: 139–146, doi:, http://projecteuclid.org/DPubS/Repository/1.0/Disseminate?view=body&id=pdf_1&handle=euclid.lnms/1215453570
- ^ "Cochran, William G.". American Statistical Association Statisticians in History.
- ^ Mosteller, Frederick, American Statistical Association Statisticians in History, http://www.amstat.org/about/statisticians/index.cfm?fuseaction=biosinfo&BioID=10
- ^ Obituary: Emeritus Professor Henry Oliver Lancaster, AO FAA, 2002, http://www.maths.usyd.edu.au/u/About/lancaster.htm
- ^ Highlights, Department of Statistics, Texas A&M University, http://www.stat.tamu.edu/stat/hilites.html
- ^ Wolfgang Saxon (2001-10-25). "Francis John Anscombe, 83, Mathematician and Professor", New York Times.
- ^ Barbara (Amato) Kuslan (2002), The History of the Yale University Department of Statistics 1963-2000, http://www.stat.yale.edu/history/HistoryAmato.html
- ^ Alexander Leitch (1978). "Statistics". A Princeton Companion. Princeton University Press.
- ^ David Leonhardt (2000). "John Tukey, 85, Statistician; Coined the Word 'Software'". New York Times.
- ^ Department of Statistics Celebrates its 40th Birthday, University of Glasgow, 2006, http://www.gla.ac.uk/departments/statistics/aboutus/news/40thbirthday/
- ^ University of Toronto Department of Statistics: About Us, http://www.utstat.utoronto.ca/pagecontent/index.php?pageid=47
- ^ Brief History of the Establishment of Statistics at Oxford, http://www.stats.ox.ac.uk/about_us/statistics_in_oxford
[edit] External links
- "Statisticians in History". American Statistical Association.
- "Life and Work of Statisticians". Department of Mathematics, University of York.
- John Aldrich. "Figures from the History of Probability and Statistics". University of Southampton.
- Lawrence H. Riddle. "Biographies of Women Mathematicians". Agnes Scott College.
