FYI: WHENEVER I tell people I’m an actuary, I often get the same response: “So you’re the guy who can tell me when I’ll die.” It was funny the first couple of times I heard it, but less so a few dozen occasions later.
Still, the comment is a good reminder of a key statistics principle: Probabilities work well for large groups, but are less useful for smaller sample sizes. Statistics help actuaries predict the number of deaths for a large population. But it’s virtually impossible to predict which specific individuals will die.
Regards,
Ted
https://humbledollar.com/2019/09/end-game/
