"Wayne.B" wrote in message
...
The concepts being wrestled with here are "precision" and "accuracy".

Precision implies repeatable results to some number of decimal places
plus or minus an uncertainty factor.

Accuracy implies the correct answer in absolute terms.

================================================== ===


On Sun, 18 Jan 2004 11:37:42 GMT, Short Wave Sportfishing
wrote:

On Sun, 18 Jan 2004 03:28:28 -0500, "Gary Warner"
wrote:


"Joe Parsons" wrote:

A nautical mile is also, precisely, 6,076.12 feet.


[HAIRSPLITTING=ON]

That's not precise--that's rounded to two decimals.
A nautical mile is, by definition, precisely 1,852 meters, as
mentioned
above.
That converts to 6,076.11549 feet (which still is not precise!).
[HAIRSPLITTING=OFF]


[HAIRSPLITTING = ON AGAIN]

Actually, the statement, "A nautical mile is also, precisely, 6,076.12
feet."
IS precise. It may not be exact, but it is precise.

[HAIRSPLITTING = OFF]

Spliting of hairs

Actually, precision is how you define precision - it is a fairly
flexible term. One can be precise to two places or ten places - it
all depends on how the number is used.

Thus, I choose to be precise to 3.88451 feet - 6,080 feet it is. ;)

/Splitting of hairs

Later,

Tom
S. Woodstock, CT
----------
"My rod and my reel - they comfort me."

St. Pete, 12 Lb. Test


Not exactly. Precision can be described to how many decimal places you go
out. Accuracy is how good is the data.

3.88451 is a precision of 5 decimal places and an accuracy of 4 decimal
places. The number can be from 3.884505 to 3.884514 And multiplying does
not increase precision, only continues the precision of the input values.
3.21 x 3.21 != 10.3041 is only accurate to 10.30. The rest of the numbers
are noise / garbage.