The Theory That Would Not Die
How Bayes' Rule Cracked the Enigma Code, Hunted Down Russian Submarines, and Emerged Triumphant from Two Centuries of Controversy
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Narrated by:
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Laural Merlington
About this listen
Bayes' rule appears to be a straightforward, one-line theorem: by updating our initial beliefs with objective new information, we get a new and improved belief. To its adherents, it is an elegant statement about learning from experience. To its opponents, it is subjectivity run amok.
In the first-ever account of Bayes' rule for general readers and listeners, Sharon Bertsch McGrayne explores this controversial theorem and the human obsessions surrounding it. She traces its discovery by an amateur mathematician in the 1740s through its development into roughly its modern form by French scientist Pierre Simon Laplace. She reveals why respected statisticians rendered it professionally taboo for 150 years - at the same time that practitioners relied on it to solve crises involving great uncertainty and scanty information, even breaking Germany's Enigma code during World War II, and explains how the advent of off-the-shelf computer technology in the 1980s proved to be a game-changer. Today, Bayes' rule is used everywhere from DNA decoding to Homeland Security.
Drawing on primary source material and interviews with statisticians and other scientists, The Theory That Would Not Die is the riveting account of how a seemingly simple theorem ignited one of the greatest controversies of all time.
©2011 Sharon Bertsch McGrayne (P)2012 TantorCritic reviews
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- Flawed Assumptions, Tortured Data, and Other Ways to Lie with Statistics
- By: Gary Smith
- Narrated by: Tim Andres Pabon
- Length: 9 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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As Nobel Prize-winning economist Ronald Coase once cynically observed, "If you torture data long enough, it will confess." Lying with statistics is a time-honored con. In Standard Deviations, economics professor Gary Smith walks us through the various tricks and traps that people use to back up their own crackpot theories. Sometimes, the unscrupulous deliberately try to mislead us. Other times, the well-intentioned are blissfully unaware of the mischief they are committing.
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Now, I can't talk to people.....
- By Andrew Dunbar on 09-28-21
By: Gary Smith
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Data Science for Dummies
- 2nd Edition
- By: Lillian Pierson, Jake Porway - foreword
- Narrated by: Chloe Cannon
- Length: 10 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Data Science for Dummies is the perfect starting point for IT professionals and students who want a quick primer on all areas of the expansive data science space. With a focus on business cases, the book explores topics in big data, data science, and data engineering, and how these three areas are combined to produce tremendous value. If you want to pick-up the skills you need to begin a new career or initiate a new project, listening to this book will help you understand what technologies, programming languages, and mathematical methods on which to focus.
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Avoid as it is useless
- By Ras on 03-01-20
By: Lillian Pierson, and others
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How Not to Be Wrong
- The Power of Mathematical Thinking
- By: Jordan Ellenberg
- Narrated by: Jordan Ellenberg
- Length: 13 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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Ellenberg chases mathematical threads through a vast range of time and space, from the everyday to the cosmic, encountering, among other things, baseball, Reaganomics, daring lottery schemes, Voltaire, the replicability crisis in psychology, Italian Renaissance painting, artificial languages, the development of non-Euclidean geometry, the coming obesity apocalypse, Antonin Scalia's views on crime and punishment, the psychology of slime molds, what Facebook can and can't figure out about you, and the existence of God.
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Great book but better in writing
- By Michael on 07-02-14
By: Jordan Ellenberg
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A History of Pi
- By: Petr Beckmann
- Narrated by: Stephen R. Thorne
- Length: 6 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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The history of pi, says the author, though a small part of the history of mathematics, is nevertheless a mirror of the history of man. Petr Beckmann holds up this mirror, giving the background of the times when pi made progress - and also when it did not, because science was being stifled by militarism or religious fanaticism.
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one of the best history books
- By Michael Wharton on 05-19-22
By: Petr Beckmann
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Beyond Measure
- The Hidden History of Measurement from Cubits to Quantum Constants
- By: James Vincent
- Narrated by: James Vincent
- Length: 10 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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A vibrant account of how measurement has invisibly shaped our world, from ancient civilizations to the modern day.
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Hoped for more information
- By A Z A R on 06-26-23
By: James Vincent
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Effective Research Methods for Any Project
- By: Amanda M. Rosen, The Great Courses
- Narrated by: Amanda M. Rosen
- Length: 12 hrs and 9 mins
- Original Recording
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We rely on effective research in many areas of life, and at times our lives even depend on it. But what is it that makes research effective? Any good research rests upon, above all else, method. In these 24 dynamic lectures, you’ll discover the remarkable procedures and techniques that make research such a powerful tool. This brilliantly conceived course gives you a deep, detailed, and practical guide to proper research methods - methods that are broadly applicable to all kinds of research.
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Leftist with double blind standard, propganda
- By Mike on 10-30-19
By: Amanda M. Rosen, and others
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The Doomsday Calculation
- How an Equation that Predicts the Future Is Transforming Everything We Know About Life and the Universe
- By: William Poundstone
- Narrated by: Kyle Tait
- Length: 8 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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In the 18th century, the British minister and mathematician Thomas Bayes devised a theorem that allowed him to assign probabilities to events that had never happened before. It languished in obscurity for centuries until computers came along and made it easy to crunch the numbers. Now, as the foundation of big data, Bayes's formula has become a linchpin of the digital economy. But here's where things get interesting: Bayes's theorem can also be used to lay odds on the existence of extraterrestrial intelligence, and on the biggest question of all: how long will humanity survive?
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incredible.
- By Ben T. on 05-22-21
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The Laws of Trading
- A Trader's Guide to Better Decision-Making for Everyone
- By: Agustin Lebron
- Narrated by: Timothy Andrés Pabon
- Length: 11 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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All of our relationships and decisions involve trading at some level. This is a book about decision-making through the lens of a professional prop trader. For years, behavioral and cognitive scientists have shown us how human decision-making is flawed and biased. But how do you learn to avoid these problems in day-to-day decisions where you have to react in real-time? What are the important things to think about and to act on?
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Not useful
- By Lonnie G. Hardy, Jr. on 09-16-19
By: Agustin Lebron
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Manias, Panics, and Crashes (Seventh Edition)
- A History of Financial Crises
- By: Robert Z. Aliber, Charles P. Kindleberger
- Narrated by: Alister Austin
- Length: 19 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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Manias, Panics, and Crashes is a scholarly and entertaining account of the way that mismanagement of money and credit has led to financial explosions over the centuries. This seventh edition of an investment classic has been thoroughly revised and expanded following the latest crises to hit international markets. Renowned economist Robert Z. Aliber introduces the concept that global financial crises in recent years are not independent events, but symptomatic of an inherent instability in the international system.
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Lack of theoretical underpinning
- By Dr. Terence M. Dwyer on 09-20-21
By: Robert Z. Aliber, and others
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Warnings
- Finding Cassandras to Stop Catastrophes
- By: Richard A. Clarke, R.P. Eddy
- Narrated by: L.J. Ganser
- Length: 12 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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Warnings is the story of the future of national security, threatening technologies, the US economy, and possibly the fate of civilization. In Greek mythology Cassandra foresaw calamities, but was cursed by the gods to be ignored. Modern-day Cassandras clearly predicted the disasters of Katrina, Fukushima, the Great Recession, the rise of ISIS, and many more. Like the mythological Cassandra, they were ignored. There are others right now warning of impending disasters, but how do we know which warnings are likely to be right?
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On prediction, catastrophe and mitigation
- By S. Yates on 02-28-18
By: Richard A. Clarke, and others
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Mathematics
- A Very Short Introduction
- By: Timothy Gowers
- Narrated by: Craig Jessen
- Length: 5 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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The aim of this book is to explain, carefully but not technically, the differences between advanced, research-level mathematics and the sort of mathematics we learn at school. The most fundamental differences are philosophical, and listeners of this book will emerge with a clearer understanding of paradoxical-sounding concepts such as infinity, curved space, and imaginary numbers. The first few chapters are about general aspects of mathematical thought.
By: Timothy Gowers
What listeners say about The Theory That Would Not Die
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Ivan
- 11-10-12
A fascinating story
The history of Bayesian statistics is fascinating, and this book ably tells the story of its twists and turns. I can understand why the author wants to insulate the reader from the mathematics, but I would have preferred a little more technical detail, especially as it applies to numerical methods. You'll come away from this book understanding how useful Bayesian inference is, but you probably won't learn very much about how it works.
I had no trouble understanding the narrator, but this is the first audiobook I've listened to in which some proper names (especially French names) were horribly mispronounced.
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3 people found this helpful
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- Henry Rosenberg MD
- 09-09-19
Amazing story
Even though I have used statistics in my work, this thoroughly researched book opened my eyes to the power of probability and statistics.
I am inspired to learn more about Bayesian and Pascal’s work
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- Maria
- 04-29-24
interesting
Very informativo, brindes the history and it is current... very interesting. I particularly like the bit about computer translations.
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- John C.
- 07-02-19
I don't get the bad reviews...
Plain and simple, if you want to learn the intricacies of Bayes Theorem please go to a textbook, there are 100's of them out there. This book was written by a journalist on the history and important events that led to the rebirth of Bayes on the 20th century. If you're familiar with Bayes, this book for sure will give you a new perspective on the topic.
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5 people found this helpful
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- Doost
- 10-17-19
educational, curious
wonderful story lines building on logic and usage of probability and its two main philosophies. a good read.
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- Mary
- 03-27-23
A nontechnical math history
The author of a book like this has to decide how technical to get. McGrayne has opted for extremely nontechnical. Unfortunately, this turns much of the book into a soap opera. There are Designated Villains (establishment types who want to keep doing things the old way), then along come Valiant Heroes (rebels who use Bayes), the Valiant Heroes solve a problem that no one else had solved – then on to the next chapter and the next problem, same story. The book is weak on explaining the math of why, on this or that particular problem, one method worked better. It’s much more informative about the individuals on both sides and about the circumstances of their conflicts.
Unless you’re already completely familiar with the math, I recommend beginning at the end – with the case study in Appendix B (Chapter 24 in the audiobook). According to the author’s numbers, if a woman in her 40s has breast cancer, the chance that she will get a positive mammogram result is about 80%. Nevertheless, if a woman in her 40s gets a positive mammogram result, the chance that she actually has breast cancer is only 3%. Why are the numbers so different? Bayes’s theorem explains how to solve problems like this. In Appendix B, the author works through the application of the theorem to this specific situation, in a way that greatly illuminates the theorem. It makes the rest of the book somewhat more comprehensible.
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- Mica Sims
- 09-10-22
Very informative and captivating
Not what you’d expect from a book on a statistics theory. It was much better.
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- Gregory
- 06-20-23
The Story Behind Bayes Theorem (Rule)
If you’re looking to learn about how to use Bayes Theorem (Rule) or learn about the components of the formula and why it’s built the way it is and how it actually works, this is NOT the book for you. If you want to learn about the history behind it, who invented it, who added to the invention, how it survived in the shadows for centuries before becoming a foundational asset to the field of probability, then you found the perfect book. I’m in no way belittling this book by saying this I’m merely stating that this is a history book not a math book. I’d like to add that learning the history of Bayes Theorem (Rule) is vital to understanding the magnitude of what this formula provides to the user. It’s a very motivating and uplifting story that shows the light at the end of the tunnel to people new to learning Bayes Theorem (Rule). We get a glimpse at its potential to make world changing revelations.
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- Timothy L Oyler
- 03-14-24
Thorough history
This book is an indepth history of the theory and its broad applications. Great base to begin study from
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- mean square
- 12-15-17
interesting history
bayes' theorem had a surprisingly tortured history. I always considered it a useful tool in a data analyst's bag. it never occurred to me that some would become so religious about its application to statistics.
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