Data Science: Probability

Probability theory is the mathematical foundation of statistical inference which is indispensable for analyzing data affected by chance, and thus essential for data scientists. In this course, you will learn important concepts in probability theory. The motivation for this course is the circumstances surrounding the financial crisis of 2007-2008. Part of what caused this financial crisis was that the risk of certain securities sold by financial institutions was underestimated. To begin to understand this very complicated event, we need to understand the basics of probability. We will introduce important concepts such as random variables, independence, Monte Carlo simulations, expected values, standard errors, and the Central Limit Theorem. These statistical concepts are fundamental to conducting statistical tests on data and understanding whether the data you are analyzing are likely occurring due to an experimental method or to chance.Note that statistical inference, the next course in this series, builds upon probability theory.