Purpose – This editorial aims to consider certain aspects of the parallel development of statistics and actuarial science that are instructive in understanding the value of intellectual cross-fertilization in research. Design/methodology/approach – The paper addresses the fundamental problem of combining information from the perspectives of both formal statistical inference and actuarial science, and discusses how the two fields not only have benefited from exchanges of ideas, but also have suffered from research isolation. Findings – The “credibility” problem of actuarial science, which involves the combining of statistical observations, may be formulated in the language of conventional statistical estimation. However, its unique concept of “collateral” information helped stimulate the development of empirical Bayesian techniques in statistics, and the actuarial literature itself has benefited from the rigorous statistical treatment of the credibility problem by conventional estimation theory. Interestingly, however, certain noteworthy gaps persist. Originality/value – The editorial illustrates how the exchange of ideas – or lack thereof – can have a profound effect on the development of science.
Download Info
To download:
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the
proper application to
view it first. Information about this may be contained
in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read
the IDEAS help
page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS
site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version under "Related research" (further below) or search for a different version of it.
Volume (Year): 9 (2008) Issue (Month): 5 (November) Pages: 417-421 Download reference. The following formats are available: HTML
(with abstract),
plain text
(with abstract),
BibTeX,
RIS (EndNote, RefMan, ProCite),
ReDIF