Michael Daly wrote:

On 15-Jun-2005, "Van D" wrote:


If you took the overall length and the waterline length of all kayaks, say,
reviewed in www.paddling.net these values would correlate highly
significantly.


I looked at that web site and couldn't find any such data. Overall lengths
were stated, but not waterline lengths.


You should precede your NG postings with a disclaimer 'I have no real
appreciation of scientific concepts'.


So you are suggesting that all kayaks have the same shaped bow and stern?
If you actually look at kayaks, you'll see that that is not true.

No, he's suggesting that you're using the term "correlation"
incorrectly. When two variables are correlated it means that they have
a tendency to vary in the same manner, not that there is a one-to-one
correspondence in each particular case. So human height and weight are
two variables with a highly positive correlation. In general people who
are taller tend to be heavier although there are certainly many cases of
a particular individual being taller than someone else who is heavier.
Similarly kayaks with a long overall length have a tendency to also have
a long waterline length.