
Stats without Tears (2016) - ghosthamlet
https://brownmath.com/swt/
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ghosthamlet
The intro is promise:

DON’T PANIC!

Douglas Adams’ The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy bore a “large, friendly
label” with those words, and that’s also my message to you.

I don’t see any reason for students to be afraid of statistics. It’s no more
difficult than any other technical course, and it’s much more practical than
other math courses. The mathematical details are here for those who want them,
but I lean heavily on technology to relieve students of the “grunt work”.

~~~
jeffwass
"Don't Panic" is generally true when learning most bodies of knowledge. Well
any situation really, but especially math and science.

I did my PhD in Physics, and I've found it's _very easy_ to become overwhelmed
by a new field of math, physics, or even a large new code base.

But eventually after you bang your head enough on the math or the code base
you realise it's not nearly as hard as you first thought.

Everything comes down to a large number of small steps. Each baby step makes
sense on its own, like each single line of code.

But the feeling of being overwhelmed can cause panic and anxiety, leading
people to lose their confidence that they can understand the new baby steps
present in whatever they're looking at.

When I was a TA back in my PhD, I would sometimes tell my students that
studying physics is like jumping off the Empire State Building. If you try it
in one big jump it's likely to end in disaster, but if you break the 1000 foot
height into 2000 steps you can easily get down to ground level.

Unfortunately some sub-par professors and teachers, or poor text books, can
exacerbate this feeling of inadequacy by resorting to complicated definitions
or explanations when simpler ones would suffice. Sometimes I think it's people
wanting to sound smart and toot their own horns, other times it's just poor
communication.

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fizixer
How does it compare/contrast with:

\- Wasserman's All of Statistics? (which I haven't read/worked on)

\- Downey's Think Stats and Think Bayes? (which I've read in bits and pieces
and have found amazing)

\- Any other well known Stats or Probability text?

~~~
lukego
I'm a non-mathematician stats newbie but here is my take:

Strength of this book seems to be that it is very approachable in a "plain
english" kind of a way. This is the first time I have seen it and I'm looking
forward to reading it.

Strength of _All of Statistics_ is that it is fast-paced and approachable even
though it is essentially a math textbook. You only need a bit of algebra to
make sense of it. That book exudes the feeling that the author wants to get
through all this theory as quickly as possible to move onto other exciting
things. (_All of Nonparametric Statistics_ by the same author is actually less
approachable and shouldn't be taken as a simplified "the good bits" subset.)

The stats book that I have had the most value out of is _Statistical Modeling:
A Fresh Approach_. It's fundamentally about making sense of different kinds of
data using a computer. [http://www.mosaic-
web.org/go/StatisticalModeling/](http://www.mosaic-
web.org/go/StatisticalModeling/)

~~~
random_moonwalk
Regarding All of Statistics, the author states that the 'reader is assumed to
know calculus and a little linear algebra'. It's a good book, though think
you'd have a tough time with only 'a bit of algebra'.

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alexbeloi
Looks like a good intro, has reference links to keywords/definitions, problems
with solutions, text-searchable.

References TI-83 or TI-84 feel dated.

~~~
sevensor
You might think that, but high schools in the United States are largely still
using these devices, even purchasing new ones.

~~~
haZard_OS
At the university I work at, these calculators are a common item on students'
desks because graphing calculators are verboten (until calculus II).

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neves
It looks nice. Did anyone read it and have an opinion?

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winter_blue
I feel like the impact of this e-book would be magnified if the author simply
took the effort to improve its design and layout.

~~~
codeisawesome
Isn’t it trivialising the effort it takes to figure out the best layout, by
adding the adjective “simply”? It’s a little offensive considering this looks
like an amazing resource out for free.

~~~
winter_blue
You're right. My bad. It takes a significant amount of effort to design a
nice/beautiful layout for an online book. Definitely not something to be
underestimated.

