# The Survivor Bias The Department of War Math



## michaelmaltby (Jun 11, 2013)

Survivorship Bias « You Are Not So Smart

Were bomber crew saved ....? Read on.


----------



## Matt308 (Jun 11, 2013)

Interesting read.

Reminds me of the experiment where people were asked to flip coins and record heads or tails for 500 flips. Part of the experiment included people who were not given a coin and were asked to flip the coin in their head and record the results. At the end, the test adminstrator could pick out the participant that flipped in their head EVERY time. Reason? These "non-coin" flippers recorded results with perhaps 3, 4 or 5 consecutive heads or tails. Wherein the participants with coins often had strings with 8, 10, 12, 15 or more consecutive heads or tails. Even though the results were statistically almost the same in the end.

Cool stuff.


----------

