Music and the Olympics – see the videos

Author: Julian Champkin

Frédéric Chopin, 1847, drawing.

Can you tell the difference between music composed by statistics and music composed by Chopin? Have a look at this video to test yourself. Usain Bolt won the 100 metres in London in an Olympic record time of 9.63 seconds; but was he the best sprinter in the Olympics? Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce won Women’s gold for Jamaica in 10.75 seconds. She did not run as fast – but perhaps her performance was more exceptional, a greater improvement on the average for women, than Bolt’s was for men. How can you tell? Listen to Stephanie Kovalchik, on video here, telling you how to work out which runner was better, and how men and women could compete on equal terms at the next Olympiad.

Bolt oozes confidence.

Image by Nick Webb/Wikimedia.

Significance magazine hosted a presentation at the American Statistical Association’s JSM in San Diego this August, where Tom and Stephanie gave talks based on articles they have written for Significance magazine. These are the video of those talks. Grand pianos are not normally needed at lectures on statistics, but Tom’s recital-cum-statistics-talk was a highlight. By happy coincidence, the conference was held on the third day of the London Olympics, which gave Stephanie’s talk especial relevance.

So, if you read the articles by Tom and Stephanie in recent issues of the magazine and want to find out more; or if you did not read them, but would like to know how statistics is equally relevant to music and to sport, have a look at the videos. Enjoy!