| "body"> | | | | given time period. |
| So you love to write and you found out about | | | | The purpose of the problem was to show how, using |
| submitting articles on the worldwide web. You ask | | | | some very basic assumptions and some minimal |
| yourself whether you can actually get good exposure | | | | mathematical theory, a common frustration could be |
| from spending time writing articles and whether it's | | | | solved. In the problem, the assumption used was that |
| worth the effort. After all, like me, you're a nobody | | | | the average time spent shopping during the Christmas |
| from nowhere. But then again, at one time so were all | | | | season was 120 minutes. Using a mathematical curve |
| the celebrities and people in the current media. Well, I | | | | called the normal distribution and a famous statistical |
| started writing articles a little less than a year ago, and | | | | theory, we can predict that more than 99% of the |
| when I started, I asked the same questions. Now that | | | | cars in our sample will vacate the designated parking |
| the Fox TV interview has aired on television and on | | | | area within 180 minutes. (Remember we used the |
| their website, I am thoroughly convinced that, yes, | | | | average mall stay of 120 minutes to get to this 180 |
| article writing is worth the effort. Read on. | | | | minute number.) |
| On a chilly night Monday, December 5, 2006 Fox 29 | | | | Based on empirical data collected from repeated |
| TV came down to the Freehold Raceway Mall in | | | | observations of cars pulling into and leaving parking |
| Freehold, New Jersey to test out my mathematical | | | | spots, the normal curve was chosen as the |
| theory about finding a mall parking spot using | | | | mathematical model to help with this problem. |
| mathematics. As Gerald Koplan, the Fox reporter | | | | Moreover, the nature of this stochastic process (a |
| stated, "This method posits an interesting theory. But | | | | stochastic process is a random process involving a |
| does it work? Well, we put it to the test, and it does." | | | | sequence of events like here cars pulling in and leaving |
| Basically, the method hinges on the two | | | | spots) led to the conjecture that over time, the interval |
| complementary mathematical disciplines of probability | | | | between cars leaving would "smoothe" out and that |
| and statistics. Much like a mortality table, which is used | | | | such interval could be calculated by dividing the number |
| by insurance companies to predict how many people | | | | of maximum minutes, in this case 180, by the number |
| of a certain age will die in a given year, the parking | | | | of designated cars, in this case 20. |
| solution predicts how many cars will "die," that is | | | | With this information in hand, and the basic |
| vacate their spots, within a given interval of time. Just | | | | assumptions granted, we can with confidence fit a |
| as an insurance company cannot predict who will die | | | | mathematical model to the data so that reliable |
| within a given year, only how many; the parking | | | | predictions can be made. What could be easier than |
| problem cannot predict which car of a group will | | | | doing a simple division to calculate how to find a |
| vacate a spot, only that one of a group will within a | | | | parking spot? And you thought math was that bad. |