Assignments

 

 

ID1 (9 out of 10 Seniors Recommend this Freshman Seminar: Statistics in the Real World)

Pomona College – Fall 2006

TuTh 11-12:15, Millikan 211

email: jo.hardin@pomona.edu

Office Hours: Mon 1:30-3pm, Wed 2-3:30pm

 

            ID1 Intern: Mary DeBoer

            email: mary.deboer@pomona.edu

            Office Hours: Sun 12:30-2pm (@ Writing Center)

                                    Tuesday 3:30-5pm (by appt., @ Writing Center)

 

 

Informal Papers

 

1. Find an example from the readings of a type of chance occurrence or situation that has a randomness component.  Explain why (inherently) it is counterintuitive.  Then explain why it is actually correct.  (Due Thursday 9/7/06)

 

2. Using one of the fiction stories, reflect on how one character is developed through the chance/random occurrences happening in the story.  (Due Thursday 9/14/06)

 

3. Find a poll (from a national newspaper, a college newspaper, a website you frequent…) and try to get as much information as you can about the poll (Who they asked, What they asked, Who funded it,…)  Then ask as many questions as you can about the poll (How do they know that? How were the people selected? Who did they miss?...)  I simply want the poll, information about the poll, and the questions you have about it.  This does not need to be written up in a “paper” type manner.  Just lists/bullet points are fine.  If you are having trouble finding a poll, check out USA Today’s Snapshots: http://www.usatoday.com/news/snapshot.htm (Due Thursday 10/5/06)

 

4. Complete the “Have a Nice Trip” investigation / applet.  Write ~1 page (typed, etc…) on the following:  Why is it important to randomize when conducting a medical study?  (Due Thursday 10/26/06)

 

5. Use the newspaper article that you have already collected on the treatment of disease X using treatment Y.  Write on the following prompt:  what constitutes evidence versus opinion?  Give some justification as well as specific examples from the article.  Please turn in the newspaper article (again) with your writing assignment.  (Due Thursday 11/09/06)

 

 

Formal Papers  (click here for the instructions and thoughts on writing a paper / giving feedback to abstracts)

 

1. Paper assignment (5-6 ish pages, choose one):   Note that all your arguments should be based on the readings.

 

* In “The Babylon Lottery” Borges suggests ways of decision making in every day life.  (Two approaches, choose only one:)

> How do his suggestions change as the lottery becomes more extreme and integrated into our/their lives?  As the story progresses, does rational decision making become possible or impossible?

> How do ideas of psychological bias play into the story and the characters’ decision making?

 

* In The Gambler, Alexey believes he is fated to win that night in the casino.  What is “fate” to Dostoevsky, how does passivity to it affect winning/losing in the figurative and literal senses throughout the novel?  How can Alexey be smart enough to know the “arithmetic” of chance abstractly but be unable to acknowledge it personally?

 

* Compare two different gamblers from The Gambler.  In what ways are they similar or different with respect to their motivation and/or destinies?  You may want to consider characteristics such as gender, nationality, age,…

 

* A topic of your choice dealing with the fiction stories we have read in class.  If you choose this option, you must meet with me at least one day before the abstract is due so that I can approve your topic.

 

Dates are:

            Abstract  (due Friday 9/22/06)

            Comments on at least 3 other abstracts (due Monday 9/25/06)

            First complete version (due Friday 9/28/06)

            Comments back Tuesday 10/3

            Revised paper (due Tuesday 10/10/06)

 

2. Paper assignment (4-5 pages).  You should write on one of the following prompts.  Note, again your arguments should be based on the readings.  It’s okay to bring in outside sources, but they must be referenced, and the majority of your arguments should be based on readings from class.

 

*  Find an article (that we haven’t used) about a controversial issue that arose due to sampling / polls.  Use the readings (e.g., Utts, Hacking, Harris & Monaco) to debunk or validate the argument in the article / issue in the poll.  For example, in the 2000 presidential election, the results from Florida were “published” (based on exit polls, not real data) before California, Washington, and Oregon’s voting booths were closed.  One could argue that there were serious political effects from the fallout of the “incorrect” exit polls (we don’t know if the exit polls were wrong, we just know that their results were different from the final results.)  Feel free to talk about this issue or any other issue you might find in a published article.  (You must cite outside reading for this option.)

 

 

*  Using a poll from the examples we’ve seen in class (fiction or non-fiction) or that you find somewhere else, discuss either/all:

 

  • The influences on the poll (e.g., political, marketing, psychological,…)
  • The results of the poll
  • The outcome of political policy based on the poll

 

Again, use the Utts, Hacking, and/or Harris & Monaco readings to back-up your arguments.  You may *not* use the Landon/FDR example unless you say something (a) different from Bryson and (b) correct.

 

*  Through research and experience, we’ve learned a lot about how to do polls well and less well.  Compare and contrast historic problems in polling with more recent problems.   (Remember, the idea of a paper is to frame an argument.  Though I say “compare and contrast” I am not looking for a bullet point list of the ways in which they are different and similar.  Sometimes a compare/contrast paper is more difficult to write than other types of papers.)

 

*  A topic of your choice dealing with the readings from this section.  If you choose this option, you must meet with me at least one day before the abstract is due so that I can approve your topic.

 

 

Dates are:

            Abstract  (due Friday 10/12/06)

            Comments on at least 3 other abstracts (due Monday 10/16/06 – note, this is fall break)

            First complete version (due Friday 10/20/06)

            Comments back Tuesday 10/24

            Revised paper (due Tuesday 10/31/06)          

 

3. Research Paper (6-8 pages).  You should write on the following prompt:  Your roommate has disease X and is considering treatment Y.  Advise.

 

* You choose X (the disease) and Y (the treatment)

 

* You should give some background into the problem.  Not a complete history of the disease, but rather why people started treating disease X with treatment Y.  Maybe a little background into what other treatments have been used before treatment Y came about.

 

* You should have a start to your research (given your newspaper article and the medical article.)  You might use the Web of Science to find out what has happened since your article was published.  One way to do this is to find articles that have cited your original article.

 

* You will still have a thesis statement that you are arguing.  However, for this paper, the thesis statement is the easy part.  Your thesis may state, for example,  “Treatment Y is a significant advance in medicine, and I would advise its use.”  Or “Treatment Y has some promising results, but the research to this point is inconclusive in terms of broad medical use.” 

 

* The argument / evidence for this paper will be the hard part.  You will be using multiple articles/studies to argue your point.

 

* You must have at least 5 references that you found.  2 of them must be from peer reviewed medical or biological journals.

 

* Your topic should be your thesis statement and a few other pertinent pieces of information (whatever you think you need to say to convey what topic you’ll be discussing.)

 

* Your bibliography should be annotated.  That means, for each reference, you need to write 1-4 sentences describing the article.  Just enough to show that you know that the article is discussing (and enough so that you’ll remember what the article says when you go back to use it!)

 

Dates are:

            Topic & Bibliography  (due Tuesday 11/14/06)

            First complete version (due Wednesday 11/22/06 – note that this is the day before Thanksgiving)

            Comments back Tuesday 11/28

            Revised paper (due Wednesday 12/06/06, 5pm – the last day of class :( )  

4. Optional Paper (5-6 pages.)  This paper is optional and can replace the grade earned on either of the first two papers. 

 

* There is no specific prompt, but the paper must deal with the topics from the last section of the class (statistics and the courtroom.)  It does not have to deal with OJ, per se, but it can.

 

* The paper is due on the Wednesday of finals week (Dec 13th.)

 

* This paper cannot replace the grade earned on the research paper.

 

* Feel free to come talk to me if you have any questions.

 

 

Other Assignments

 

* Library Assignment (due Tuesday 10/3/06)

 

            Find two articles about a particular treatment for a given disease or medical condition.  One of the articles must be from a peer-reviewed journal (for example, The Journal of the American Medical Association or The New England Journal of Medecine).  The other article must be something from the mainstream press.  You can find the second article on-line, but it has to also exist in paper (for example, it’s okay if you get it from the NY Times on-line, but you should be able to tell me the date it appeared in print in the NY Times.)  The articles should discuss the same disease or medical condition, and ideally they’ll also discuss the exact same treatment and study (this will make your life easier in about a month.)  Your assignment is to simply give me a copy of the articles.