This volume brings together a collection of essays on the history and philosophy of probability and statistics by an eminent scholar in these subjects. Written over the last fifteen years, they fall into three broad categories. The first deals with the use of symmetry arguments in inductive probability, in particular, their use in deriving rules of succession. The second group deals with three outstanding individuals who made lasting contributions to probability and statistics in very different ways. The last group of essays deals with the problem of "predicting the unpredictable."
Contents
Part I. Probability: 1. Symmetry and its discontents; 2. The rule of succession; 3. Buffon, Price, and Laplace: scientific attribution in the eighteenth century; 4. W. E. Johnson's sufficientness postulate. Part II. Personalities: 5 Abraham De Moivre and the birth of the Central Limit Theorem; 6 Ramsey, truth, and probability; 7. R. A. Fisher on the history of inverse probability; 8. R. A. Fisher and the fiducial argument; 9. Alan Turing and the Central Limit Theorem; Part III. Prediction: 10. Predicting the unpredictable; 11. The continuum of inductive methods revised.
Review
"insightful."
MAA Reviews, MathDL
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