The Mathematician, the Statistician, and the Philosopher
November 30th, 2009
One day a mathematician, a statistician, and a philosopher were out having a walk in the countryside when they saw a brown cow in a field.
The statistician said, “See that cow. From that we can conclude that all cows in this country are brown.”
“Oh no,” the mathematician replied, “we can only conclude that at least one cow in this country is brown.”
But the philosopher shook his head. “Both of you are wrong. The only thing that we can conclude is that the side of this particular cow which is facing us appears to be brown at this moment in time.”
