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Re: RANDOMN function [message #86499 is a reply to message #86498] Thu, 14 November 2013 06:46 Go to previous messageGo to previous message
Mats Löfdahl is currently offline  Mats Löfdahl
Messages: 263
Registered: January 2012
Senior Member
Den torsdagen den 14:e november 2013 kl. 14:59:11 UTC+1 skrev fd_...@mail.com:
> Hi
>
> I used the RANDOMN function to add Gaussian noise to my data like this:
>
> noise=RANDOMN(seed,N)
>
> When I print, the mean values of RANDOMN(seed,N) I didn't get zero but something around 0.0337187.
>
> I expect to get something very very close to zero since the RANDOMN function returns normally-distributed, floating-points with a mean of zero. Is my assumption wrong? It's correct that the median is not zero?

You will get better statistics the larger the set:

IDL> for e=1,9 do print,e,10d^e,mean(randomn(seed,10d^e))
1 10.000000 0.0489258
2 100.00000 0.0172675
3 1000.0000 -0.0336368
4 10000.000 -0.00799687
5 100000.00 0.00208867
6 1000000.0 -0.00101986
7 10000000. -0.000105310
8 1.0000000e+08 0.000104068
9 1.0000000e+09 2.46072e-05
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