|
What
would the world
be like if the normal curve was not discovered?
In
the month of October, we ran a Twitter contest which asked
the question, "What would the world be like if the
normal curve was not discovered?" (#WithoutTheCurve).
The three winners were randomly selected from the responses
received from a wide-range of participants, from well-known
academics to high-school students. Congratulation to the
winning tweets!
Victoria
Allred (@VictoriaAllred):
#WithoutTheCurve treatment opportunities for cancer would
never be found.
Nicholas
Horton (@askdrstats):
#WithoutTheCurve haiku:
Without the normal, heavy tails lead to black swans.
Grace
Ricks (@gracewricks):
#WithoutTheCurve
If there was no normal curve, there would be no way to distinguish
the ordinary .
If you are a winner looking to claim your prize, please email
your mailing address to tamingofchance<at>vretta.com
for your autographed copy of "Struck by Lightning: The
Curious World of Probabilities".
Alternately please Twitter-follow the Fields Institute so
that a response can be made using direct message rather than
a public Tweet (to make sure no one else claims your prize).
Following
on this, the Fields Institute and the American Statistical
Association are offering a $ 1500 cash prize to the best story
that builds on these answers and imagines a world where the
normal curve was never discovered. The competition is now
open to submissions http://tamingofchance.vretta.com
Contest
Details and Regulations
Submissions for the Normal Curve contest will begin on September
25th, 2013 at 12:01 AM EST. All eligible submissions must
be posted to Twitter and must address the contest question
to be selected in the draw. Entries must be available by October
15th, 2013 at 11:59 PM EST. Entries must be tagged as #WithoutTheCurve
for contest submission.
Judging
will take place after the contest closes on October 15th,
2013 at 11:59 PM EST. The top entries, as selected by volunteers
at the Fields Institute's MathEd Forum on the basis of appropriateness
to the contest question, will be shortlisted into a pool for
drawing the prizes. A winner will be randomly selected for
each of the 3 copies of Struck by Lightning (autographed by
the author of the book) which will be shipped by mail.
Shipping
costs of up to $20 per book will covered by the competition
organizers. Should actual costs exceed this amount, the winner
will be asked to either cover the excess or forfeit the prize.
The
contest is open to all users, internationally. Submissions
that are not in English may be translated using Google Translate
if there is no one on the judging panel who can translate
the Tweet.
All
winning entries will be deemed to fall under the Creative
Commons Attribution License 3.0, as detailed on the following
webpage http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
Issuance of the prize will be contingent on a confirmation
of this license.
Winners
of the contest will be announced by the end of October 2013
and will be contacted through their Twitter account from the
FieldsInstitute’s Twitter account. Participants are
encouraged to Twitter-follow the Fields Institute so that
a response can be made using direct message rather than a
public Tweet, ensuring the proper identity is obtained.
We
proudly celebrate the International Year of Statistics 2013
as well as the Fields Institute for Research in Mathematical
Sciences 20th anniversary with
a unique contest which seeks to expand the minds of coming generations!
|
