Hamming, "Unreliable Data" (May 26, 1995)
Channel: securitylectures
Date: 2012-08-26

Intro: It has been my experience, as well as many others who have looked; data is generally much less accurate than it is advertised to be. This is not a trivial point - we depend on initial data for many decisions, as well as for the input data for simulations which result in decisions. Since the errors are of so many kinds and I have no coherent theory to explain them all, I have therefore to resort to isolated examples and generalities from them.



The Art of Doing Science and Engineering: Learning to Learn" was the capstone course by Dr. Richard W. Hamming (1915-1998) for graduate students at the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) in Monterey California. 

This course is intended to instill a "style of thinking" that will enhance one's ability to function as a problem solver of complex technical issues. With respect, students sometimes called the course "Hamming on Hamming" because he relates many research collaborations, discoveries, inventions and achievements of his own. This collection of stories and carefully distilled insights relates how those discoveries came about. Most importantly, these presentations provide objective analysis about the thought processes and reasoning that took place as Dr. Hamming, his associates and other major thinkers, in computer science and electronics, progressed through the grand challenges of science and engineering in the twentieth century.