As part of our efforts to gain recognition by OUS attorney Ryan Hagemann as an “Institutionalized News Media Organization” we are starting a new throwaway advertising section, just like printed newspapers. Print out and then recycle this post in an approved container or just follow the links to some great gift ideas. (We get a 4% commission on all sales.)
- A Million Random Digits with 100,000 Normal Deviates. The Rand Corporation. Perfect for the English Lit professor on your gift list.
- 128 ounces of Tuscan Whole Milk. Best served in Reidl stemware.
- How to Avoid Huge Ships
by Captain Peter Trimmer. Sure, $1,586 is a lot for a book, but if you apply the precautionary motive you should get two.
- And don’t miss –
Disclaimer: While this post is not meant as an endorsement of any institutional religious organization, if Hagemann adds a religious test to his other first amendment restrictions, we are prepared to check all those boxes too. 12/23/2012.
“A Million Random Digits with 100,000 Normal Deviates” gets a lot of joke reviews, but it was actually a very important work for its time. Nowadays our sources of entropy are much more reliable, but before computing resources were common having a million statistically random digits at your fingertips proved to be invaluable. It was also easy for other researchers to validate your work, since they could the reference as an identical seed.
I confess that I used “A Million Random Digits” for my MS degree – though I can’t remember exactly why. Then my advisor bought me an HP-15C which had a Ran # function. I won a few drinks off him in the Crystal Bar in Bozeman, before he realized it was psuedo-random with a seed of 0, and I’d memorized the sequence.
Dog Age-Dates UOMatters
Having been a resident of Montana once, I actually have been to the Crystal Ball and I know its been around for some time now (I think it dates back to the mid 1930’s). Assuming that
UOmatters was a Whiz Kid and somehow a Whiz Kid in Montana, then his post is inaccurate as an HP-15C didn’t exist in 1955.
Perhaps UOmatters has confused himself with Dr. Emmett Brown, another well known Whiz Kid.
Hey Dog, I got it from the library. Early eighties, last century, maybe the one before that, it’s getting fuzzy. Large building, many books, no food or drinks allowed. The Crystal, on the other hand, had no books and definitely allowed drinks!
I lived one block east on Main Street next to the Rockin R, in this building, which met an untimely end a few years ago: http://www.newwest.net/city/article/explosion_in_downtown_bozeman_destorys_two_bars_evacuates_two_blocks/C396/L396/