Data Data and Data

Statistics is all about dealing with information. And information is contained in data. In today's era of information, everything is data driven. From government to small business, even an individual makes decision based on data. Making decision without data makes no sense.

I was following a link posted by Ragib on his Facebook, and found the following interesting piece of information:

Google is a high energy environment. Lots of smart people with big ideas. Everything is data driven. Decisions are made based on data that has been analyzed, and going forward everything is monitored and measured based on the data. Opinions and “gut feel” are considered too, but in the end, results are measured by data. Even things like travel expense caps for airfares and hotels are data driven. They keep track of every trip taken and the actual costs for airfares and hotels, then establish the caps based on the data. [Source]

From a previously published article in New York times, we've seen how Google is utilizing the power of data in setting their plans and actions.

When I was an undergraduate student of Applied Statistics at the Institute of Statistical Research and Training under University of Dhaka, we were told of a book by Kazi Motahar Husain, the pioneer of Statistics in Bangladesh. The book, titled Tottyho Gonit (Information Mathematics), was published from Bangla Academy. However, it was out of print when I last checked at their outlet.

So statistics deals with data and it summarizes data using graphs, diagrams and some numerical measures (averages, median, et cetra) and makes it presentable for easier understanding of the underlying information. In other words, statistics uncovers the information contained in data.