Question

Recently several hockey games in the Olympics were decided in a post-overtime shootout, winning by just one point. Statistically, I would say that the two teams are actually identical. Yet one gets the gold, one the silver... or one moves on, one is eliminated. In speed skating, the difference between first and second was in 1/1000s of a second. In bobsleigh, on the other hand, Canada and Germany tied for gold, and the measurement was to the 1/100th of a second. Given that the competitors in these examples are statistically identical in skill, do you think it makes sense to differentiate by a score/point that does not demonstrate statistical difference? To what tolerance should performance be measured? (1/1000th of a second? Out until there is a difference?) What is meaningful? Consider all this and write your opinion, using concepts from the class. There is no right or wrong answer as far as this assignment goes, provided you justify your position and put enough effort into it.

Answer 1

Yes, statistically if they differ by 1/1000 of a second then they might be of equal on the skill being tested, but in a competition other things like pressure handling, the presence on that day, etc matters as well, and if we are talking about a competition in which the entire thing takes only a few seconds, then measuring this precisely to 1/1000 of a second makes complete sense, it would have been an entirely different case if the event or competition in consideration was taking minutes or hours to complete. So in my opinion it's right to measure to the shortest of time interval to decide a winner in a competition.