Statisticians and the EPA: What's the Connection?

摘要

The EPA is a federal regulatory agency charged with protecting human health and the environment. So what is the role of a statistician, and how does it differ from statisticians elsewhere? Some of the observations might surprise you. For reasons that must date back to the year Congress passed the Law of Large Numbers, statisticians seem to be considered the folks who sit in some back room and derive joy in analyzing data, trying to find something "significant." I recognize that to many, our profession is one in which deviation is a standard. But, here at the EPA, we are not in the back room. The problems are very real and very applied.