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Example of samples from two populations with the same mean but different standard deviations. Red population has mean 100 and SD 10; blue population has mean 100 and SD 50. A large standard deviation indicates that the data points can spread far from the mean and a small standard deviation indicates that they are clustered closely around the mean.
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In the empirical sciences, the so-called three-sigma rule of thumb (or 3 σ rule) expresses a conventional heuristic that nearly all values are taken to lie within three standard deviations of the mean, and thus it is empirically useful to treat 99.7% probability as near certainty.
For example, if the mean height in a population of 21-year-old men is 1.75 meters, and one randomly chosen man is 1.80 meters tall, then the "error" is 0.05 meters; if the randomly chosen man is 1.70 meters tall, then the "error" is −0.05 meters.
Any non-linear differentiable function, (,), of two variables, and , can be expanded as + +. If we take the variance on both sides and use the formula [11] for the variance of a linear combination of variables (+) = + + (,), then we obtain | | + | | +, where is the standard deviation of the function , is the standard deviation of , is the standard deviation of and = is the ...
These values follow from the properties of the normal distribution, and they apply only if the measurement process produces normally distributed errors. In that case, the quoted standard errors are easily converted to 68.3% ("one sigma"), 95.4% ("two sigma"), or 99.7% ("three sigma") confidence intervals. [citation needed]
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In metrology, measurement uncertainty is the expression of the statistical dispersion of the values attributed to a quantity measured on an interval or ratio scale.. All measurements are subject to uncertainty and a measurement result is complete only when it is accompanied by a statement of the associated uncertainty, such as the standard deviation.