The word "statistics," for most people, conjures up an image of pages upon pages of numbers or, in any event, numbers (often large) that have been massed to prove or illustrate an argument. Descriptive statistics is the name given to the art of arranging large quantities of data in manageable form and of calculating a few numbers from these data to describe and clarify their nature. Statistical inference, on the other hand, is the art of making statements about large collections of things on the basis of an examination of relatively few of them. We examine briefly the subject of descriptive statistics in the first section; inference occupies our attention in the remainder of the chapter.

3.1 Analysis of data

3.2 Population and sample

3.3 What if it were?

3.4 Liars