Supergrunch Posted November 13, 2009 Posted November 13, 2009 So who wants to do my homework for me? Do a word-association experiment to see how your subjects' mental lexicons are organised. Actually I might just do it myself - it seems quite fun. I'd do that, although I'm a theoretical linguist rather than a psycholinguist. The lexicon is pretty much a mystery, however. Can someone help me with: Use the binomial theorem to show that (1 + 2/(n^1/2))^n >= n for n >= 1 (>= is "greater than or equal to") Hmm, I've forgotten a lot of my binomial type stuff so won't be much help. Odwin may well be decent at that, what with being a statistician and all.
Mr_Odwin Posted November 13, 2009 Posted November 13, 2009 Hmm, I've forgotten a lot of my binomial type stuff so won't be much help. Odwin may well be decent at that, what with being a statistician and all. I've had a stab at it, and can't do it. I'm hoping chair will give us the solution so it will end my misery. It's annoying that I can't do first year maths. You lose it.
Supergrunch Posted November 13, 2009 Posted November 13, 2009 I've had a stab at it, and can't do it. I'm hoping chair will give us the solution so it will end my misery.It's annoying that I can't do first year maths. You lose it. I have a friend who got a first in maths at Cambridge, and went on to do the optional 4th year, but then when into programming, and now says he barely remembers how to do A-level further maths like eigenvectors, let alone degree level stuff. For some reason maths is so much easier to forget than anything else...
chairdriver Posted November 13, 2009 Posted November 13, 2009 (edited) I managed it: EDIT: When I put (n-2!) I meant (n-2)! Edited November 13, 2009 by chairdriver
Mr_Odwin Posted November 13, 2009 Posted November 13, 2009 (edited) I love it. You only need the first and third terms of the expansion. Everything else is just chaff. Edited November 13, 2009 by Mr_Odwin
Raining_again Posted November 13, 2009 Posted November 13, 2009 Wow, a man with tidy handwriting! *is amazed*
Dannyboy-the-Dane Posted November 14, 2009 Posted November 14, 2009 Wow, a man with tidy handwriting! *is amazed* Oi! We're not all terrible at orderly stuff!
chairdriver Posted November 14, 2009 Posted November 14, 2009 Wow, a man with tidy handwriting! *is amazed* That's quite messy for my standards as well!
Molly Posted November 14, 2009 Posted November 14, 2009 Chair, would it be alright if I started calling you Will Hunting? It's better than Carol Smillie anyway
chairdriver Posted November 18, 2009 Posted November 18, 2009 There are n people present in a room. (a) What is the probability that at least two of them celebrate their birthday on the same day? How large need n be for this probability to be more than 1/2 ? (Ignore leap years.) (b) What is the probability that at least one of them celebrates their birthday on the same day as you? How large need n be for this probability to be more than 1/2 ? I'm really bad at probability...
Mr_Odwin Posted November 18, 2009 Posted November 18, 2009 It's an old well known problem. Just google "birthday problem" and you'll see loads of stuff. 23 if I remember rightly for the second part of (a) - it's a low number surprise!.
Supergrunch Posted November 18, 2009 Posted November 18, 2009 (edited) It's an old well known problem. Just google "birthday problem" and you'll see loads of stuff.23 if I remember rightly for the second part of (a) - it's a low number surprise!. Yep, I've also come across this before, and the answer to (a) is indeed 23. I guess you can adapt the method used to reach this to answer part (b). Oi! We're not all terrible at orderly stuff! I really am, or at least when it comes to handwriting. Even I can barely read my notes, I should post a sample some time. Edited November 18, 2009 by Supergrunch
Dannyboy-the-Dane Posted November 18, 2009 Posted November 18, 2009 Yep, I've also come across this before, and the answer to (a) is indeed 23. I guess you can adapt the method used to reach this to answer part (b). I really am, or at least when it comes to handwriting. Even I can barely read my notes, I should post a sample some time. I've been pretty bad at it, too. Let's just say there is an opposite correlation between the speed with which I write and the readability of what I write. :p
Mr_Odwin Posted November 18, 2009 Posted November 18, 2009 My handwriting is in my sig and avatar. Soak it in peeps, soak it in.
Twozzok Posted November 22, 2009 Posted November 22, 2009 (edited) help. this is my text file @band name@cd name@[email protected]@1234@ @copy cat@cd sss@[email protected]@5678@ @bandd ddd@cddd ddd@[email protected]@1234@ this is my output: and this is my code: http://www.twozzok.com/code.txt My problem, it's not displaying the last entry in the text, but just gives me an error. Whyy ? !_! EDIT: If I add another entry, it still only displays the first two. EDIT^2: And now it suddenly works without changing anything O_o it seems the last record of the one i pasted in here fucks it all up. If I delete it I can add whatever, but re-adding that one makes it bugger up. EDIT^3: It seems for band name and cd name, if the last three chars are the same it errors. Edited November 22, 2009 by Twozzok
jayseven Posted November 24, 2009 Posted November 24, 2009 Ok, I need to do a psycholinguistic 'experiment'. Here's the required speel: I'd appreciate your participation in my test; a simple word-association task. I will present to you a list of twelve words, and you are to respond to each with the first four words you think of. Please do not worry about how 'good' or 'appropriate' your choices are, just try to say the first four that you think of. My intention is to analyse how words are connected within our minds, to see whether one proposed 'model' is more accurate than another. If you could PM me with your response rather than posting them here, I'd be very grateful. Your results and my analysis should be confidential, and you are free to ask me to remove your results from my assignment at anytime. I'm also conducting this experiment in the real world, but I'd like to have two solid groups to compare and contrast. So here are the words, in spoiler tags so you can think about one word at a time; Butterfly Walking Advertisement Happy Legible Salt Hungry Red Dog Dismal Convenience Summer Thanks for any help, guys.
chairdriver Posted November 25, 2009 Posted November 25, 2009 Let A = {person has disease} and B = {test is positive} Does the sentence "A laboratory test is 95% effective in detecting a certain disease when it is in fact present" imply P(A ∪ B) = 0.95 or P(B ∣ A) = 0.95? It's integral to working out the rest of the problem!
Paj! Posted November 25, 2009 Posted November 25, 2009 (edited) @ Jayseven I'm doing it now, but I'm not sure how to actually do it. With the first one, I got an image in my head, as I repeated the word out loud. Do I describe elements of the image? Or wait until I analyse what words really make up what I think about said word? EDIT: For example; the second one, I got 1 that was a word that popped into my head, "Rain", and 3 that really just described the "stock" image of the action in my head; "Street" "man" "grey". I know you said that anything goes, but I don't think it's actually doing it right. It's just descriptive. Edited November 25, 2009 by Paj!
jayseven Posted November 25, 2009 Posted November 25, 2009 Paj; that's part of the crit regarding the test. Often people would take the stimuli then 'chain' the associations off of that. I suppose the test asks for the four strongest associations, so if you think "rain" then "man in rain", and the latter is stronger than your thought for "monkeys" then that's ok... But altogether the test is heavily flawed, and really the only way that sort of event is ironed out is by averages. If I get 100 people to take part then your little meander would become insignificant to the results as a whole. Er. yeah. I dunno. It's rather silly.
Mr_Odwin Posted November 25, 2009 Posted November 25, 2009 Let A = {person has disease} and B = {test is positive} Does the sentence "A laboratory test is 95% effective in detecting a certain disease when it is in fact present" imply P(A ∪ B) = 0.95 or P(B ∣ A) = 0.95? It's integral to working out the rest of the problem! P(B | A) = 0.95
Paj! Posted November 25, 2009 Posted November 25, 2009 Hmm...I might just not take part at all. Rain was the only word that came to me, seperate of the stock image in my head, due to walking, walking, walking, in the rain, a lyrics from Grace Jones (someone else originally). The rest is me sturggling to think about what is most important from the image in my head. I don't think that's proper, and it's too time consuming. For no.3, I got an image from Blade Runner/Batman, kinda a roof-top at night with the big neon adverts from those kinda fantasy cityscapes. No words again though.
chairdriver Posted November 25, 2009 Posted November 25, 2009 Three biased coins C(1), C(2) , C(3) lie on a table. Their respective probabilities of falling heads when tossed are 1/3, 2/3 and 1. A coin is picked at random, tossed, and observed to fall heads. Calculate the probability that it is C(k) for each k = 1, 2, 3. Given that a coin has been tossed once and observed to fall heads, calculate the prob- ability that a second throw of the same coin will also produce heads. I'm not sure what to set as my conditional probability thingys for the first bit? A = {toss gives heads} , B(k) = {coin C(k) was chosen} ?
jayseven Posted November 25, 2009 Posted November 25, 2009 Paj; I wrote up, printed and handed in teh essay this morning :P No worries But it's always fun to put your own associations under the microscope. Makes you kinda introspective and quizzical.
Paj! Posted November 25, 2009 Posted November 25, 2009 Hmm. Well I recently found out (and this showed) that I think in images, and have a huge "stock" of images in my head? We've done "mood boards" a few times at college, but mine always end up as more descriptive collages, and the tutors said I have a really good eye for collage (bit like being told you're good at making tea, but it pleased me), as I kinda think of images I've seen throught my life/experiences, rather than just randomly flicking through magazines and sticking shite in. [/off topic] EDIT: Obviously we all "think in images", that sounds rubbish. But I think it's why I want to do something like film or graphic design.
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