[R] variance of discrete uniform distribution

[Michael Erickson]

On Mon, Mar 8, 2010 at 3:44 PM, casperyc <casperyc at hotmail.co.uk> wrote:
>
> Hi Rolf Turner ,
>
> God, it directed to the wrong page.
>
> I firstly find the formula in wiki, than tried to verify the answer in R,
> now, given that 143/12 ((n^2-1)/12 ) is the correct answer for a discrete
> uniform random variable,
> I am still not sure what R is calculating there?
> why it gives me 13?

Of RT's two points, you addressed (b) continuous vs. discrete, but you
have yet to address (a) population estimate based on a sample.  Hint:
var(1:12) tries to estimate the population variance based on a sample.
 You are interested in the population variance.  They are calculated
different formulas that differ *only in the denominator*.

Michael


>
> Thanks!
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