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Archive for the ‘Misc’ Category.
Do people use Fortran?
I’m very sure that Fortran is one of the major scientific programming languages. Many functions, modules, and libraries are written in this language. Without being aware of, these routines are ported into many script languages. However, I become curious whether Fortran is still the major force in astronomy or statistics, compared to say 20 years ago (10 seems too small). Continue reading ‘Do people use Fortran?’ »
The chance that A has nukes is p%
I watched a movie in which one of the characters said, “country A has nukes with 80% chance” (perhaps, not 80% but it was a high percentage). One of the statements in that episode is that people will not eat lettuce only if the 1% chance of e coli is reported, even lower. Therefore, with such a high percentage of having nukes, it is right to send troops to A. This episode immediately brought me a thought about astronomers’ null hypothesis probability and their ways of concluding chi-square goodness of fit tests, likelihood ratio tests, or F-tests.
First of all, I’d like to ask how you would like to estimate the chance of having nukes in a country? What this 80% implies here? But, before getting to the question, I’d like to discuss computing the chance of e coli infection, first. Continue reading ‘The chance that A has nukes is p%’ »
data analysis system and its documentation
So far, I didn’t complain much related to my “statistician learning astronomy” experience. Instead, I’ve been trying to emphasize how fascinating it is. I hope that more statisticians can join this adventure when statisticians’ insights are on demand more than ever. However, this positivity seems not working so far. In two years of this slog’s life, there’s no posting by a statistician, except one about BEHR. Statisticians are busy and well distracted by other fields with more tangible data sets. Or compared to other fields, too many obstacles and too high barriers exist in astronomy for statisticians to participate. I’d like to talk about these challenges from my ends.[1] Continue reading ‘data analysis system and its documentation’ »
- This is quite an overdue posting. Links and associated content can be outdated.[↩]
To Become a Good Astronomer
By accident, a piece of paper was found from my old text book. I have no idea who wrote this, nor how old it is. Too old to be obsolete? But it has general description to become a good person and scientist Continue reading ‘To Become a Good Astronomer’ »
2010 SBSS STUDENT PAPER COMPETITION
The Section on Bayesian Statistical Science (SBSS) of the American Statistical Association (ASA) would like to announce its 2010 student paper competition. Winners of the competition will receive partial support for attending the 2010 Joint Statistical Meetings (JSM) in Vancouver, BC.
Eligibility
The candidate must be a member of SBSS (URL: www.amstat.org/membership/chapsection.pdf) or ISBA (International Society for Bayesian Analysis). Those candidates who have previously received travel support from SBSS are not eligible to participate. In addition, the candidate must be a full-time student (undergraduate, Masters, or Ph.D.) on or after September 1, 2009.
A manuscript, suitable for journal submission, is required for entry. The candidate must be the lead author on the paper, and hold the primary responsibility for the research and write-up.
The candidate must have separately submitted an abstract for JSM 2010 through the regular abstract submission process, to present applied, computational, or theoretical Bayesian work. Papers should be submitted for presentation at the JSM as topic contributed or invited papers. Those papers not already a part of a session should be submitted online using the following settings:
(at URL: www.amstat.org/meetings/jsm/2010/index.cfm?fuseaction=abstracts):
* Abstract Type: Topic contributed
* Sub Type: Papers
* Sponsor: Section on Bayesian Statistical Science
* Organizer: Alyson Wilson
* Organizer e-mail: agw -at- iastate.edu
Application Process
The deadline for application is Feb. 1 (same as the JSM 2010 abstract submission deadline). A formal application including the following materials should be emailed to Prof. Vanja Dukic (vanja -at- uchicago.edu):
a) CV
b) Abstract number (from the ASA JSM 2010 abstract submission)
c) Letter from the major professor (advisor) or faculty co-author, verifying the student status of the candidate, and briefly describing the candidate’s role in the research and writing of the paper
d) The manuscript, suitable for journal submission, in .pdf format.
Selection of Winners
Papers will be reviewed by a committee determined by the officers of the SBSS. Criteria for selection will include, but are not limited to, significance and potential impact of the research. Decisions of the committee are final, and will be announced in the Spring before the JSM.
Prizes
Prizes will consist of a certificate to be presented at the SBSS section meeting and partial support (up to $1000) for attending the JSM. Please note that the awards may be unable to cover the entirety of any winner’s travel, so winning candidates may need to supplement the SBSS award with other funds. To receive a monetary prize, the winner will need to provide proof of membership and submit travel receipts to the SBSS treasurer after the JSM.
Magic Crystal
Over the few years, at the heart of astronomical researches, I see astronomers treat statistics like a magic crystal. Continue reading ‘Magic Crystal’ »
Where is ciao X ?
X={ primer, tutorial, cookbook, Introduction, guidebook, 101, for dummies, …}
I’ve heard many times about the lack of documentation of this extensive data analysis system, ciao. I saw people still using ciao 3.4 although the new version 4 has been available for many months. Although ciao is not the only tool for Chandra data analysis, it was specifically designed for it. Therefore, I expect it being used frequently with popularity. But the reality is against my expectation. Whatever (fierce) discussion I’ve heard, it has been irrelevant to me because ciao is not intended for statistical analysis. Then, out of sudden, after many months, a realization hit me. ciao is different from other data analysis systems and softwares. This difference has been a hampering factor of introducing ciao outside the Chandra scientist community and of gaining popularity. This difference was the reason I often got lost in finding suitable documentations. Continue reading ‘Where is ciao X ?’ »
Another exciting news (with no use)
I wish I could chase all rabbits. Another rabbit I missed came to a realization by a friend, who was sure that I already knew this “call for papers” notice for the special issue of the signal processing magazine (SPM). Although those due dates were mistaken (the white paper due was several months back), my friend thought it would be useful for me and my group just in case I didn’t know about it. Yes, I was very delighted such things were on going. No doubt that I was disappointed when the white paper due was long gone. Continue reading ‘Another exciting news (with no use)’ »
Mt. Mathematics
Is Calculus the ultimate goal of mathematical education? Arthur Benjamin has a slightly subversive suggestion in this TED presentation.
Continue reading ‘Mt. Mathematics’ »
how to trace?
I was at the SUSY 09 public lecture given by a Nobel laureate, Frank Wilczek of QCD (quantum chromodynamics). As far as I know SUSY is the abbreviation of SUperSYmetricity in particle physics. Finding such antimatter(? I’m afraid I read “Angels and Demons” too quickly) will explain the unification theory among electromagnetic, weak, and strong forces and even the gravitation according to the speaker’s graph. I’ll not go into the details of particle physics and the standard model. The reason is too obvious. 
Instead, I’d like to show this image from wikipedia and to discuss my related questions.
Continue reading ‘how to trace?’ »
Bayesian machine learning workshop, featuring an astronomy application
I’ve copied below the text of an ISBA announcement for the first workshop in a new series addressing Bayesian methods for machine learning. It builds on the model of the earlier well-known “Bayesian case studies” workshops, where just a few applications are featured at each workshop, with the format tailored to produce a lot of back-and-forth between application scientists and statisticians.
One of the three topics for the October workshop is titled “Calibrating the Universe: a Bayesian Uncertainty Analysis of a Galaxy Simulation.” This sounds a bit reminiscent of the “cosmic calibration” work by a collaboration of astronomers and statisticians at Los Alamos. They are using a combination of parametric and nonparametric Bayesian methods and dimensional reduction and experimental design techniques to infer cosmological parameters from CMB, large scale structure, and Type Ia supernova data. Despite the similarity in nomenclature, this appears to be a different team and a different application. However, from what I can glean from the team, it’s the same kind of problem: implementing a parametric Bayesian analysis with a computationally expensive model, by building a fast nonparametric “emulator” for the model. Should be interesting.
Continue reading ‘Bayesian machine learning workshop, featuring an astronomy application’ »
Datums
For someone who doesn’t know any grammar, I can be a bit of a Grammar nazi sometimes. And one of my pet peeves is when people use the word data in the singular. No! Data are!
Or so I used to believe. Continue reading ‘Datums’ »
[Book] The Physicists
I was reading Lehmann’s memoir on his friends and colleagues who influence a great deal on establishing his career. I’m happy to know that his meeting Landau, Courant, and Evans led him to be a statistician; otherwise, we, including astronomers, would have had very different textbooks and statistical thinking would have been different. On the other hand, I was surprised to know that he chose statistics over physics due to his experience from Cambridge (UK). I thought becoming a physicist is more preferred than becoming a statistician during the first half of the 20th century. At least I felt that way, probably it’s because more general science books in physics and physics related historic events were well exposed so that I became to think that physicists are more cooler than other type scientists. Continue reading ‘[Book] The Physicists’ »