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5 votes
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How would you justify to a non-statistician why we should use an unbiased estimator instead of a maximum likelihood estimator?

Say we have the maximum likelihood estimator (which is usually biased) and an unbiased estimator and the sample size is small enough that these estimator are substantially different in magnitude. We'...
cgmil's user avatar
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14 votes
4 answers
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How does one explain what an unbiased estimator is to a layperson?

Suppose $\hat{\theta}$ is an unbiased estimator for $\theta$. Then of course, $\mathbb{E}[\hat{\theta} \mid \theta] = \theta$. How does one explain this to a layperson? In the past, what I have said ...
Clarinetist's user avatar
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