``Stark data on women: 100 million are missing", ``Jack or Jill?", ``Do right-handers live longer?"
Read the New York Times article ``Stark data on women: 100 million are missing" and answer the following questions:
Suppose that a certain society values sons more than daughters. In this society, a couple will continue bearing children until they produce a son, at which point they will retire from the child-bearing business.
(a) Would this family-planning scheme tend to produce more boys, or more girls?
(b) Using coin tosses, simulate the generation of twenty families. Make histograms for the number of sons and the number of daughters. Find the average and the standard deviation of the number of sons and the number of daughters. In light of this data, are you inclined to change your answer to the previous question?
Read the article ``Jack or Jill" in Lancet and answer the following questions:
(a) If couples could magically determine the sex of their offspring, what would happen? Would there be a sudden increase in the number of boys, or girls? If so, would this imbalance correct itself?
(b) If society were able to prevent the use of this magical method, would it have the right to do so? If so, would it be well-advised to do so?
Read the article ``Do right-handers live longer?" The article states that the mean age at death for the 1,472 right handers was 64.64 years (s.d. = 15.5) and 236 left-handers was 63.97 years (s.d. = 15.4). Are these differences significant? Does the graph of the difference in cumulative death rates convince you that there is a difference?
A Casino owner once said ``Even if we took the 0 and 00 off the roulette wheel we would still win all kinds of money since most people would come in with a fixed amount of money and play until that have lost all their money." Was he correct? Justify your answer !