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My take on the Giants list

Posted By: Matt Cohn-Geier
Date: Tuesday, 23 February 2016, at 1:54 a.m.

In Response To: My take on the Giants list (Christian Munk-Christensen)

Here is one from 1907: http://www.all-about-psychology.com/support-files/the-wisdom-of-crowds.pdf

When asked how much an ox weighed, the median guess of a crowd of 787 people was 1207 lbs and the mean was 1197 lbs. The actual answer was 1198.2 lbs (margin of error of 0.1%).

There are some basic conditions that have to be met. For example, the question has to have a simple, stable, quantifiable answer, and you have to ask enough people. If you only ask 3 people you may not get a very accurate answer, but if you ask 1,000 people it will probably be extremely close.

One more: http://www.trendfollowing.com/whitepaper/ExplainingWisdom.pdf. This link seems to suggest a ~3% margin of error on jellybeans for a crowd of 70 people, even though the crowd was relatively small and some individuals in the crowd were wrong by as much as 267%.

There are probably other studies but not so easy to find online. Some are behind paywalls. I know that there have been repeated studies with the consistent result that the crowd outperforms any individuals.

I suggest http://www.amazon.com/The-Wisdom-Crowds-James-Surowiecki/dp/0385721706 if you have further interest in this topic.

Messages In This Thread

• My take on the Giants list
  Matt Cohn-Geier -- Monday, 22 February 2016, at 12:02 p.m.
  • My take on the Giants list
    MishyPoo -- Monday, 22 February 2016, at 12:50 p.m.
    • My take on the Giants list
      Colin Owen -- Monday, 22 February 2016, at 2:01 p.m.
    • My take on the Giants list
      Matt Cohn-Geier -- Tuesday, 23 February 2016, at 2:12 a.m.
      • My take on the Giants list
        Casper Van der Tak -- Tuesday, 23 February 2016, at 7:11 a.m.
        • Wisdom of the Crowds for Ranking
          Casper Van der Tak -- Tuesday, 23 February 2016, at 10:23 a.m.
  • My take on the Giants list
    Rick Janowski -- Monday, 22 February 2016, at 1:38 p.m.
  • My take on the Giants list
    Ken Larsen -- Monday, 22 February 2016, at 2:11 p.m.
  • Question about Giants voting
    Ken Larsen -- Monday, 22 February 2016, at 2:19 p.m.
    • Question about Giants voting
      Rick Janowski -- Monday, 22 February 2016, at 2:28 p.m.
      • Question about Giants voting
        Ken Larsen -- Monday, 22 February 2016, at 2:42 p.m.
        • Question about Giants voting
          Rick Janowski -- Monday, 22 February 2016, at 3:37 p.m.
          • Question about Giants voting
            Ken Larsen -- Monday, 22 February 2016, at 4:03 p.m.
            • Question about Giants voting
              Matt Cohn-Geier -- Monday, 22 February 2016, at 8:03 p.m.
              • Question about Giants voting
                Ken Larsen -- Monday, 22 February 2016, at 8:30 p.m.
  • My take on the Giants list
    Albert Steg -- Monday, 22 February 2016, at 5:20 p.m.
  • My take on the Giants list
    Taper_Mike -- Monday, 22 February 2016, at 9:18 p.m.
    • My take on the Giants list
      Rick Janowski -- Monday, 22 February 2016, at 9:51 p.m.
    • My take on the Giants list
      Timothy Chow -- Tuesday, 23 February 2016, at 12:26 a.m.
      • My take on the Giants list
        Bob Koca -- Tuesday, 23 February 2016, at 12:57 a.m.
      • My take on the Giants list
        Taper_Mike -- Tuesday, 23 February 2016, at 9:59 a.m.
        • My take on the Giants list
          Bob Koca -- Tuesday, 23 February 2016, at 4:10 p.m.
  • My take on the Giants list
    Christian Munk-Christensen -- Monday, 22 February 2016, at 10:49 p.m.
    • My take on the Giants list
      Bob Koca -- Tuesday, 23 February 2016, at 12:56 a.m.
    • My take on the Giants list
      Matt Cohn-Geier -- Tuesday, 23 February 2016, at 1:54 a.m.
      • My take on the Giants list
        Bob Koca -- Tuesday, 23 February 2016, at 3:07 a.m.
        • My take on the Giants list
          Matt Cohn-Geier -- Tuesday, 23 February 2016, at 4:03 a.m.
          • john.stryker@gmail.com
            John Stryker -- Tuesday, 23 February 2016, at 4:40 a.m.
      • My take on the Giants list
        Havard Raddum -- Tuesday, 23 February 2016, at 8:22 a.m.
      • My take on the Giants list
        Dorn Bishop -- Wednesday, 24 February 2016, at 12:27 a.m.
  • My take on the Giants list
    Jake Jacobs -- Tuesday, 23 February 2016, at 1:33 a.m.
  • My take on the Giants list
    Florin Popa -- Wednesday, 24 February 2016, at 11:28 a.m.