Mathematical and statistical challenges (December 13, 2006) Category: Statistical theory

A regular poster on the EDSTAT-L list (DR) mentioned an interesting page on the IBM website, www.research.ibm.com/ponder, that offers a monthly puzzle on mathematical topics. Some of these topics involve statistics and/or probability, such as the January 2006 puzzle:

Consider a loop of string of unit length. Suppose we cut the string independently and at random in n places. This will divide the loop into n pieces. This month's puzzle asks 1. What is the expected (average) size of the smallest piece? 2. What is the expected (average) size of the largest piece?

This webpage was written by Steve Simon and was last modified on 07/08/2008.