mathematics

Ted Hill (mathematician)

Ted Hill (mathematician) 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 Ted Hill (mathematician) rather than just read about it. In short: Theodore Preston Hill (born December 28, 1943), professor emeritus at Georgia Tech, is an American mathematician specializing mainly in probability theory. He is an Elected Member of the International Statistical Institute (1993), and an Elected Fellow of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (1999).

Key takeaways

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

Reference excerpt

Theodore Preston Hill (born December 28, 1943), professor emeritus at Georgia Tech, is an American mathematician specializing mainly in probability theory. He is an Elected Member of the International Statistical Institute (1993), and an Elected Fellow of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (1999).

Contributions Hill discovered what many consider to be the definitive proof of Benford's law. He is also known for his research in the theories of optimal stopping (including the secretary problem and prophet inequality) and of fair division, in particular the Hill–Beck land division problem. Hill has attracted widespread attention for a paper on the variability hypothesis, the theory that men exhibit greater variability than women in genetically controlled traits that he wrote with Sergei Tabachnikov. A later version authored by Hill alone was peer reviewed and accepted by The New York Journal of Mathematics and retracted after publication. A revised version, again authored by Hill alone, was subsequently peer reviewed again and published in the Journal of Interdisciplinary Mathematics.

Education and career Born in Flatbush, New York, he studied at the United States Military Academy, and Stanford University (M.S. in Operations Research). After graduating from the U.S. Army Ranger School and serving as an Army Captain in the Combat Engineers of the 25th Infantry Division in Vietnam, he returned to study mathematics at the University of Göttingen (Fulbright Scholar), the UC Berkeley College of Letters and Science (M.A., Ph.D. under advisor Lester Dubins), and as NATO/NSF Postdoctoral Fellow at Leiden University. He spent most of his career as a professor in the Georgia Institute of Technology College of Sciences, with temporary appointments at Arts and Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, Tel Aviv University, the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, the University of Göttingen (Fulbright Professor), the University of Costa Rica, the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, the Mexican Centre for Mathematical Research (CIMAT), and as Gauss Professor in the Göttingen Academy of Sciences and Humanities.

Selected publications Theodore P. Hill (1995). "A Statistical Derivation of the Significant-Digit Law" (PDF). Statistical Science. 10 (4): 354–363. doi:10.1214/ss/1177009869. MR 1421567. Theodore P. Hill (July–August 1998). "The First Digit Phenomenon" (PDF). American Scientist. 86 (4): 358+. Bibcode:1998AmSci..86..358H. doi:10.1511/1998.4.358. S2CID 13553246. Theodore P. Hill (July–August 2000). "Mathematical Devices for Getting a Fair Share" (PDF). American Scientist. 88 (4): 325+. Bibcode:2000AmSci..88..325H. doi:10.1511/2000.4.325. S2CID 221539202. Theodore P. Hill (March–April 2009). "Knowing When to Stop". American Scientist. 97 (2): 126+. doi:10.1511/2009.77.126. S2CID 124798270. Arno Berger & Theodore P. Hill (2015). An Introduction to Benford's Law. Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0-691-16306-2. Theodore P. Hill (2017). Pushing Limits: From West Point to Berkeley and Beyond. American Mathematical Society and Mathematical Association of America. ISBN 978-1-4704-3584-4. Theodore P. Hill (2018). "Slicing Sandwiches, States, and Solar Systems". American Scientist. 106 (1): 42–49. doi:10.1511/2018.106.1.42. Theodore P. Hill & Kent E. Morrison (2023). "The Math of Beach Pebble Formation". American Scientist. 111 (3): 168–175. doi:10.1511/2023.111.3.168.

References

External links "Ted Hill's webpage". Theodore Preston Hill at the Mathematics Genealogy Project

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Ted Hill (mathematician)

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Ted Hill (mathematician) 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 Ted Hill (mathematician) 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 Ted Hill (mathematician) 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 Ted Hill (mathematician)

In research: Ted Hill (mathematician) 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 Ted Hill (mathematician) 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: Ted Hill (mathematician) is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1943 births, 20th-century American statisticians, 21st-century American mathematicians, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Ted Hill (mathematician) 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.

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How to study Ted Hill (mathematician) in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Ted Hill (mathematician) 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 Ted Hill (mathematician) out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Ted Hill (mathematician) in simple terms?

Why does Ted Hill (mathematician) 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 Ted Hill (mathematician)?

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 Ted Hill (mathematician).