All Times ET
Keywords: Graphical perception, Graphical principles, LOWESS, LOESS
Bill Cleveland has made – and continues to make – profound contributions to many areas of Statistical Computing and Statistical Graphics. The research he has carried out, informed by a wide variety of important practical problems he has solved, has resulted in statistical tools and methods that are transforming our every-day approach to how we explore and analyse data, and display the results. One vital aspect of Bill’s ‘modus operandi’ has been his ability to assemble teams of outstanding collaborators who, collectively, have the requisite skills and knowledge to solve the whole problem, including practical implementation. This light-hearted but nonetheless sincere tribute to Bill’s scientific contribution focuses mainly on the part of the vast canvas of his work that relates to graphical perception, the subject of the first “silver book”, and Bill’s consequent development of principles of graph construction. It is part of a ‘tag team’ effort with Ryan Hafen, who will be describing Bill’s more recent research into statistical graphics, particularly in the context of analysing, modelling and interpreting Big Data sets.