The questions of fit in the gregor mendel controversy

Abstract

Ever since R. A. Fisher published his 1936 article , "Has Mendel's Work Been Rediscovered?", historians of both biclogy and statistics have been fascinated by the surprisingly high conformity between Gregor (Johann) Mendel's observed and expected ratios in his famous experiments with peas. Fisher's calculatftl x² statistic of the experiments, taken as a whole, suggested that results on a par or better than those Mendel reported coultl only be expected to occur about three times in every 100,000 attempts. The ensuing controversy as to whether or not the good Father "sophisticated" his data has continued to this very day. In recent years the controversy has focused upon the more technical question of what underlying genetic arrangement Mendel actually studied.

The statistical issues of the controversy are exam:.led in am historical and comparative perspective. The changes the controversy has gone through are evaluated, and the nature of its current, more biological, status is briefly discussed.

Keywords:

• Goodness of fit
• P-value
• chi-square understimation
• histroy of science