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Revisiting Francis Galton’s forecasting competition. (English) Zbl 1331.62025
Summary: This note reexamines the data from a weight-judging competition described in the article “Vox populi” by Francis Galton published in [Nature 75, 450–451 (1907)]. Following the correction of some errors, it is shown that this forecasting competition is an interesting precursor of two more recent developments in the statistical forecasting literature. One is forecast combination, with the mean forecast here exactly coinciding with the outcome, and the second is the use of two-piece frequency and probability distributions to describe asymmetry.

##### MSC:
 62-03 History of statistics 01A60 History of mathematics in the 20th century 62F07 Statistical ranking and selection procedures
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##### References:
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