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Poisson Processes and the Probability of Poop

...it happens

Joel Smith
Thu, 01/15/2015 - 15:03
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Body

On a recent vacation, I was unsuccessfully trying to reunite with my family outside a busy shopping mall and starting to get a little stressed. I was on a crowded sidewalk, in a busy city known for crime, and it was raining. I thought there was no way things could get more aggravating when something warm and solid hit my arm and shirt.

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A bird had pooped on me.

Not having the kids with me, and being in a foreign country, I used a couple of words in English that best represented my feelings towards the bird and the entire situation. Being a generally positive person, I quickly recovered once I got dry, cleaned up, and had the kind of beverage you have when you've been defecated on and want to de-stress. I told the kids, who of course found it funny. I even laughed a little.

What are the odds?

Two days later, in a small beach town, my wife and I were returning from a hike. I wasn't even thinking about the poop incident any longer when something warm and solid hit my shirt and shorts.

A bird had pooped on me. Again.

 …

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Comments

Submitted by William A. Levinson on Fri, 01/16/2015 - 11:38

Random vs. Assignable Cause

I used this to explain random and assignable causes. E.g. somebody buys an expensive car, and it gets birded while out in the open--that is random cause. If he parks it under a tree, that's an assignable cause.

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Submitted by MathGrl on Sun, 01/18/2015 - 09:54

Along the same lines ...

I have a very large backyard and 4 big dogs. I've thought about making 2-foot blocks across my backyard and counting the "poop per block" to see if it can be modeled as a Poisson distribution.

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Submitted by William A. Levinson on Sun, 01/18/2015 - 10:50

In reply to Along the same lines ... by MathGrl

Dog doo is not a random arrival

Dogs smell the area to decide where they want to do their business, so the arrivals would probably not be random.

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Submitted by MathGrl on Sun, 01/18/2015 - 14:01

In reply to Dog doo is not a random arrival by William A. Levinson

Good point!

I wonder then if this would work with another animal, such as cows, pigs, or horses. Do they also decide based on smell?

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