Talk:Continuous or discrete variable: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 17:27, 30 April 2015

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==a flawed and clumsy definition==

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:::::Okay, fair, but fragment of ''what'' topic, though... I'd propose just changing "in mathematics" to "in statistics", though as Sławomir says we already have a better article for that, so in that case maybe just junk this. --[[User:GodMadeTheIntegers|GodMadeTheIntegers]] ([[User talk:GodMadeTheIntegers|talk]]) 17:27, 30 April 2015 (UTC)

Here is a possible source:[https://books.google.com/books?id=RM1D3mFw2u0C&pg=PA7&dq=continuous+discrete+variable+math&hl=en&sa=X&ei=uGtCVeT-F-TjsAS4noGYDw&ved=0CB0Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=continuous%20discrete%20variable%20math&f=false]. On page 7, this author states that continuous variables take on values in an interval of the real numbers, while discrete mathematics involves no limiting processes (i.e. the range has no limit points) and usually involves a finite range.

I'll try to find more sources. While we may not like the vagueness, a published definition is better than our own.[[User:Brirush|Brirush]] ([[User talk:Brirush|talk]]) 17:59, 30 April 2015 (UTC)

== Not a dichotomy ==

I recognize this is a useful intuition for people beginning math (especially applied, especially stats), but the problem is that the actual formalisms disagree: discrete is trivially continuous. Look no further than https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discrete_space : we can give anything a topology and make it continuous. And this isn't actually that removed from stats: More advanced stats, e.g. working with arbitrary probability measures. uses highly related formalisms.

I don't want to derail, and especially don't want to get into a sub-field war, but at least calling out the various uses of the terminology and how they conflict would I think be useful. <!-- Template:Unsigned --><small class="autosigned">—&nbsp;Preceding [[Wikipedia:Signatures|unsigned]] comment added by [[User:Sonarpulse|Sonarpulse]] ([[User talk:Sonarpulse#top|talk]] • [[Special:Contributions/Sonarpulse|contribs]]) 05:49, 12 January 2020 (UTC)</small> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->