Customer Reviews

Introduction to Probability and Statistics for Engineers and Scientists, Third Edition

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

When I first took Statistics at the college level I received an Incomplete. When I cleared my incomplete, I received a D.

I later transferred to a less rigorous major at a less rigorous school. The books required for my Statistics classes then were titled things like "Business Statistics". Having an easier time figuring out the bare basics of Statistics in these classes, I wish I had Ross to dig deeper into topics I now understood. Even though my first experience with Statistics was not successful I remembered Ross to be one of the best books from my old school.

I think that for the person who is 1) familiar with the concepts of Prob & Stats, or who is 2) flying through Business Statistics or Statistics for Social Scientists, and who wants A) to know more about the MATH behind intro Stats and Probability, or B) wants to explore a more rigorous approach to the subject, (but one that you can actually follow -- this is given one's ease with the concepts) Ross is great..

Someone who is not really familiar with the basic concepts of Statistics and has had trouble with other math classes in college may have trouble with Ross as well.. But he does a good job at trying to make it simple, given that it's math.

It then, goes without saying, that it is a great introduction for Engineers and Scientists into Statistics. For those who are good at college-level math (typically successful Eng & Sci undergrads are), this book will probably be easier to follow than a lot if not most of the books in your other courses.

This is a very poorly written book, examples are not clearly shown or in some cases not even properly done. One example problem in chapter two gives the question and the answer is "Through a series of mathematical equations and procedures you get this: (answer)" with no helpful information. Proper tables and information may be pages away from the actual example or explanation. Some sentences are broken by formulas with no relevance to what the sentence is describing, only for you to find out the equation is for an example you were looking at several pages earlier. There are typos and errors on every page, which my professor had to continuously correct and tell us what to actually do.

The only reason I would buy this book for is if your class requires it and you have no other way to get problem sets. I would definitely suggest another book.

I have a record of straight As in every undergrad math course there is, and some graduate ones too. I am back in school as a PhD candidate, and find this book among the worst I have seen on the topic. The author's explanation of concepts are poor or nonexistent, and the examples skip steps and do not provide the student the opportunity to learn incrementally. I have reviewed several books on the subject now, and I recommend checking out Prob & Stats for Engineers and Scientists by Walpole and Meyers, 6th Edition. It's crystal clear, consistent and is saving my degree program!

A textbook without any answers. Formulas given without any derivations. And, at least in the 3rd edition, errors that made it past the proofreaders that shouldn't have been missed!

Example 2.3e, p22, a simple calculation to find the mean:
x(bar) = (9+16+15+20+30+42)/40 = 3.05
What did they use to calculate this? An abacus?

Figure 2.6 on p 16 is labelled "A cumulative frequency plot", when in the 2nd paragraph below it is correctly stated "A cumulative relative frequency plot of Table 2.3 is given in Figure 2.6."

This is just the beginning of my class... Can't wait to find more errors...

Naturally. probability and counting are difficult concepts to grasp. So therefore, let's make a book without answers in the back (ehm, what's the point of solving a problem if you don't have anything to check it against?). I'm rather surprised this comes out of an engineer.

What I'm not surprised by is the explanations. They are like bombs. Basically, here's an equation, it works, use it (maybe that's how engineers work?). Why does it work? Derivation? Hello? Wherever there are actually explanations I would not consider them enough for a regular student to understand.

I'm disappointed, this book is making my prob and stats course harder than it should be.

I have used this book for a course on probability and statistics for engineers, and will not use it again. The author is apparently more versed on probability than on statistics, because the latter topics are poorly explained. A section on linearization in the regression chapter is actually a dangerous misapplication and should be replaced by material explaining nonlinear regressions. The section on analysis of variance uses dot notation that's different from the standard used in most other texts and will therefore be confusing to many. The CD that's provided is not useful in a pedagogic sense since it is a "black box" in its actual function. But the most serious shortcoming in this book is the failure to bridge the gap between theory and application: there are no worked examples in most cases, just equations in the chapter, then problems at the end.

This is neither a stats 101 book for some liberal arts students not a book for advanced studies in mathematical studies.

I have a degree in maths and engineering and had to learn some stats for a project I had to work on. This book was the best one I could find in the library. Easy to read with just right amount of mathematical detail.

If you have a quantitative degree and you want/need to learn stats quickly this is your book.

So this is my first Prob & Statis class at school.. After reading most of the reviews of this book I mostly agree with all of you..

This book DOES have a lot of errors.. However.. I think that those errors make me more alert as to what I'm learning..

Even my professor told me, " the reason I like this book is because 50% of the solution manual is wrong.. and mixed up.. it forces you to think.. to become a real engineer... " (Im trying to be a EE)

So my review to this book is as follow ... buy it if you REALLY study a lot and have interest in probability & statistics.. u wont find it hard.. & interest in engineering of course..

This book has good organization of subject matter. The examples used are pretty good too.

However, within no more than an hour of flipping through various chapter of my interest, I found 2 errors. What baffled me was that the errors were so easy to catch and yet they existed in the THIRD edition! Unforgivable!

I reckon at this rate there have to many more to be unearthed! The author definitely needs better proof-reading.

One of the best introductory book on Probability and Statistics. As in the title, this book is written for Engineers and Scientists. Highly recommended. I have used this book for 3 years as a TA.