Type of Talk: UTCS Colloquium

Speaker/Affiliation: D

r. Persi Diaconis/Stanford University

Date/Time: Friday, February
19, 2010, 3:15 p.m.

Location: GSB 2.124

Host: Dr. Paul

Damien

Talk Title: The Search for Randomness

Talk Abstract:

I will take a careful look at some of our most primitive images of ran

dom phenomena: flipping a
coin, shuffling cards, and rolling a roule

tte ball.  In each case, physics and math show that
(usually) t

hings are not very random.  Some implications to the use and misuse o

f "statistical
modeling" are drawn.

Speaker B

io:

Professor Diaconis began his career as a magician,
before proceeding to earn a Ph.D. in
Mathematical Statistics from Har

vard University.  He was twice awarded the prestigious MacArthur
Fellowship. With over 200 papers to his credit, he has made path-breaking
contributions to many
areas of mathematics and statistics.  His
influential monograph, Group Representations in
Probability and Stat

istics, is just one example of his fertile and versatile ability to advanc

e
research in diverse branches of mathematics.  In the popular m

edia, Professor Diaconis is best
known for his famous and important r

esult that it takes seven riffle shuffles to ?randomize? a
deck of car

ds.