08/06/04

1.  Errors
   Error in science does not mean a mistake. It rather means inevitable uncertainty which happens because of empirical measurements and can not be perfectly corrected. Therefore, we will treat 'error' in a sense of 'uncertainty'.

2. Sources of errors
   Let's imagine you are measuring a vertical jump height using a chalk and a ruler in a traditional way. Let's also assume that a real vertical jump height was 75.00374 cm. However, there is no way you can achieve this accuracy using a ruler because of several sources of errors. There is a possibility your estimation is too crude to get a certain level of accuracy. Some error sources are intrinsic, in other words, the tape measure could have inaccurate markings on it, the markings are not fine enough, and so on.

3. Best estimation ± Uncertainty
   The best way to state the result of measurement is to use the best estimate of quantity and the range within which the quantity may vary. In general, the result of any measurement is described as
   (1) Measured value x = x_best ± dx
   where x_best is the best estimate of the measurement and  dx is the uncertainty (error or margin error). You are confident that the actual quantity lies in the range of uncertainty.

4. [Under Construction]

5. Error propagation

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