FEYNMAN CHALLENGE #1: “What is the average weight of a human begin who is currently alive?” This is a question I posted several months ago which it turns out is remarkably difficult to determine with any accuracy using online statistical resources. The problem is that although most countries make an attempt to collect accurate census information, it’s very rare that weight information is included in census data. In addition, most statistical databases tend to favor the USA and western nations where the average weight of an individual tends to be higher than the worldwide average. Using online data available, the best guess I’ve come up with is significant to only one digit of precision, which is not very accurate. That’s a bit bit like saying the age of the Universe is approximately 10 billion years old ((1±0.5)x10¹⁰ years), when science has pinned down significantly more digits — 13.798±0.037 billion years ((13.798±0.037)×109 years to be precise. Although my answer isn’t very precise, I believe it is fairly accurate (in the right ballpark). Feel free to express your own answers (in pounds, or pounds and kilograms). Since I’ve previously posted what I consider to be the right answer, there won’t be any prize for guessing correctly, but it’s interesting to see how difficult it becomes to research this problem with any sort of scientific accuracy.
Posted on: Fri, 17 Oct 2014 15:53:28 +0000
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