Hand David J
Imperial College London, London, UK
Philos Trans A Math Phys Eng Sci. 2015 Apr 13;373(2039). doi: 10.1098/rsta.2014.0252.
The nature of statistics has changed over time. It was originally concerned with descriptive 'matters of state'--with summarizing population numbers, economic strength and social conditions. But during the course of the twentieth century its aim broadened to include inference--how to use data to shed light on underlying mechanisms, about what might happen in the future, about what would happen if certain actions were taken. Central to this development was Ronald Fisher. Over the course of his life he was responsible for many of the major conceptual advances in statistics. This is particularly illustrated by his 1922 paper, in which he introduced many of the concepts which remain fundamental to our understanding of how to extract meaning from data, right to the present day. It is no exaggeration to say that Fisher's work, as illustrated by the ideas he described and developed in this paper, underlies all modern science, and much more besides. This commentary was written to celebrate the 350th anniversary of the journal Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society.
统计学的性质随时间而改变。它最初关注描述性的“国家事务”——总结人口数量、经济实力和社会状况。但在二十世纪，其目标扩大到包括推理——如何利用数据来揭示潜在机制、未来可能发生的情况以及采取某些行动会发生什么。罗纳德·费希尔是这一发展的核心人物。在他的一生中，他对统计学的许多重大概念进展负责。他1922年的论文尤其说明了这一点，在该论文中，他引入了许多概念，这些概念至今仍是我们理解如何从数据中提取意义的基础。毫不夸张地说，费希尔在本文中所描述和发展的思想为所有现代科学奠定了基础，甚至远远不止于此。这篇评论是为庆祝《皇家学会哲学学报》创刊350周年而撰写的。
