mathematics

Richard Tweedie

Richard Tweedie is a mathematics topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Richard Tweedie rather than just read about it. In short: Richard Lewis Tweedie (22 August 1947 – 7 June 2001) was an Australian statistician. Education After having completed his undergraduate studies and a Master of Arts at the Australian National University, Tweedie moved to Cambridge University, where he obtained his doctorate under the supervision of David George Kendall in 1972.

Key takeaways

Richard Tweedie belongs to mathematics; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Richard Tweedie to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Richard Tweedie from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Richard Lewis Tweedie (22 August 1947 – 7 June 2001) was an Australian statistician.

Education After having completed his undergraduate studies and a Master of Arts at the Australian National University, Tweedie moved to Cambridge University, where he obtained his doctorate under the supervision of David George Kendall in 1972. Additionally, in 1986 he was awarded a Doctor of Science degree from the ANU for his major contributions to the theory of Markov chains on a measurable state space.

Career Tweedie joined the company Siromath in 1981 as general manager, and became its managing director in 1983. He taught at Bond University as Foundation Dean and Foundation Professor of Information Sciences from 1987 to 1992, after which he joined the faculty of Colorado State University (CSU). He was chair of CSU's Department of Statistics from 1992 to 1997, and left CSU to join the faculty of the University of Minnesota in 1999. When he died in 2001 of a heart attack, he was the chair of the University of Minnesota's Division of Biostatistics.

Tobacco industry consulting Tweedie did some work as a tobacco industry consultant during his career. This work included presenting his analysis of studies on the health effects of passive smoking at a 1980 meeting, to which he had been invited by the industry.

Recognition Tweedie was elected as a Fellow of the American Statistical Association in 1997.

References

Further reading Dunsmuir, William T. M.; Meyn, Sean P.; Roberts, Gareth (June 2002). "Obituary: Richard Lewis Tweedie". Journal of Applied Probability. 39 (2): 441–454. doi:10.1017/S0021900200022671. ISSN 0021-9002.

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Richard Tweedie

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Richard Tweedie claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In mathematics, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Richard Tweedie before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Richard Tweedie ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Richard Tweedie

In research: Richard Tweedie appears in mathematics research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Richard Tweedie in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Richard Tweedie is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1947 births, 2001 deaths, 20th-century Australian statisticians, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Richard Tweedie outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

Affiliate

Preply — study more efficiently by working with a personal tutor. 50% off.

How to study Richard Tweedie in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Richard Tweedie means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Richard Tweedie out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Richard Tweedie in simple terms?

Richard Lewis Tweedie (22 August 1947 – 7 June 2001) was an Australian statistician. Education After having completed his undergraduate studies and a Master of Arts at the Australian National University, Tweedie moved to Cambridge University, where he obtained his doctorate under the supervision of…

Why does Richard Tweedie matter?

Because it connects several mathematics ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Richard Tweedie?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Richard Tweedie.