A must-read for anyone who makes business decisions that have a major financial impact.As the recent collapse on Wall Street shows, we are often ill-equipped to deal with uncertainty and risk. Yet every day we base our personal and business plans on uncertainties, whether they be next month's sales, next year's costs, or tomorrow's stock price. In "The Flaw of Averages," Sam Savage-known for his creative exposition of difficult subjects- describes common avoidable mistakes in assessing risk in the face of uncertainty. Along the way, he shows why plans based on average assumptions are wrong, on average, in areas as diverse as healthcare, accounting, the War on Terror, and climate change. In his chapter on Sex and the Central Limit Theorem, he bravely grasps the literary third rail of gender differences.Instead of statistical jargon, Savage presents complex concepts in plain English. In addition, a tightly integrated web site contains numerous animations and simulations to further connect the seat of the reader's intellect to the seat of their pants.The "Flaw of Averages" typically results when someone plugs a single number into a spreadsheet to represent an uncertain future quantity. Savage finishes the book with a discussion of the emerging field of Probability Management, which cures this problem though a new technology that can pack thousands of numbers into a single spreadsheet cell.Praise for "The Flaw of Averages""Statistical uncertainties are pervasive in decisions we make every day in business, government, and our personal lives. Sam Savage's lively and engaging book gives any interested reader the insight and the tools to deal effectively with those uncertainties. I highly recommend "The Flaw of Averages."" --William J. Perry, Former U.S. Secretary of Defense "Enterprise analysis under uncertainty has long been an academic ideal. . . . In this profound and entertaining book, Professor Savage shows how to make all this practical, practicable, and comprehensible." ---Harry Markowitz, Nobel Laureate in Economics

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平均值缺陷

萨姆·萨维奇（(Sam Savage）

斯坦福大学工程学院顾问教授，剑桥大学贾奇商学院研究员，其父为美国著名统计学家伦纳德·吉米·萨维奇(Leonard Jimmie Savage)。作者长期从事与统计学和风险评估相关的工作和研究，根据“决策应基于对不确定的未来更大程度的主观判断”的观点，逐渐发展出一种风险建模的新方法“概率管理”，并带领着由Frontline系统公司、甲骨文公司以及SAS软件研究所等机构组成的社团开发了概率分布列（DIST）——这是一种用来储存概率分布的新型电脑数据类型。作者还自任Probability Management．0rg网站的主席。

作者在许多专业期刊和大众媒体上发表过文章，比如《哈佛商业评论》、《投资组合管理杂志》、《华盛顿邮报》以及《今日奥姆斯》（ORMSToday）杂志等。除了教书育人和科学研究之外，他还为众多的企业、机构和政府部门提供咨询和培训服务。