Karl Pearson is considered the founder of the science of statistics. In developing ways to analyze and represent scientific observations, he laid the groundwork for the development of the field of statistics in the twentieth century.
Pearson was born in London, England, on March 27, 1857, to William Pearson, a lawyer, and Fanny Smith. At the age of nine, Karl attended the University College School but was forced to withdraw at sixteen because of poor health. After a year of private tutoring, he went to Cambridge, where the distinguished King's College mathematician E. J. Routh met with him each day at 7 a.m. to study papers on advanced topics in applied mathematics. In 1875, he was awarded a scholarship to King's College, where he studied mathematics, philosophy, religion, and literature. At that time, students at King's College were required to attend divinity lectures. Pearson announced that he would not attend the lectures and threatened to leave the college; the requirement was dropped. Attendance at chapel services was also required, but Pearson sought and was granted an exception to the requirement. He later attended chapel services, explaining that it was not the services themselves, but the compulsory attendance to which he objected. He graduated with honors in mathematics in 1879.
After graduation, Pearson traveled in Germany and became interested in German history, religion and folklore. He studied law in London, but returned to Germany several times during the 1880s. He lectured and published articles on Martin Luther, Baruch Spinoza, and the Reformation in Germany, and wrote essays and poetry on philosophy, art, science, and religion. Becoming interested in socialism, he lectured on Karl Marx on Sundays in the Soho district clubs of London. During this period, Pearson edited a book on elasticity as it applies to physical theories and taught mathematics, filling in for professors at Cambridge. In 1884, at age 27, Pearson became the Goldsmid Professor of Applied Mathematics and Mechanics at University College in London.
In 1885, Pearson became interested in the role of women in society. He gave lectures on what was then called "the woman question," advocating the scientific study of questions on sex difference and gender. He married Maria Sharpe in 1890. They had three children, Egon, Sigrid, and Helga. Maria died in 1928, and Pearson married Margaret V. Child, a colleague at University College, the following year.
Pearson was greatly influenced by Francis Galton and his 1889 work on heredity, Natural Inheritance. Pearson saw that there often may be a connection, or correlation, between two events or situations. By making use of the broader concept of correlation, Pearson believed that mathematicians could discover new knowledge in biology and heredity.
A young professor of zoology, W. F. R. Weldon, asked Pearson for help on statistics regarding Darwin's theory of natural selection. From their association came many years of productive research devoted to the development and application of statistical methods for the study of problems of heredity and evolution. Pearson became the Gresham College Professor of Geometry in 1891. His lectures for two courses there became the basis for a book The Grammar of Science in which he presented his view of the nature, function, and methods of science. He dealt with statistical problems by means of graphs and diagrams and illustrated the concepts with examples from nature and the social sciences. In later lectures, he discussed probability and chance, using games such as coin tossing, roulette, and lotteries as examples. He described frequency distributions such as the normal distribution (sometimes called the bell curve because its graph resembles the shape of a bell), skewed distributions (for which the graphed design is not symmetrical), and compound distributions (which might result from a mixture of the two).
Pearson introduced the concept of the "standard as a measure of the variance within a population or sample. The standard deviation statistic refers to the average distance from the mean score for any score within the data set, and therefore suggests the average amount of variance to be found within the group for that variable. Pearson also formulated a method, known as the chi-square, of measuring the likelihood that an observed relation is in fact due to chance, and used this method to determine the significance of the statistical difference between groups. He also developed the theory of correlation and the concept of regression, used to predict the research results. His correlation, also known as the Pearson r , is a measure of the strength of the relationship between variables and is his best-known contribution to the field of statistics.
Between 1893 and 1901 Pearson published 35 papers in the Proceedings and the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, developing new statistical methods to deal with data from a wide range of sources. This work formed the basis for much of the later development of the field of statistics. Pearson became the Galton Professor of Eugenics in 1911, and headed a new department of applied statistics. He retired in 1933 at age 77, and received an honorary degree from the University of London in 1934. Pearson died on April 27, 1936, in Coldharbour, Surrey.
Pearson produced more than three hundred published works in his lifetime. His research focused on statistical methods in the study of heredity and evolution but dealt with a range of topics, including albinism in people and animals, alcoholism, mental deficiency, tuberculosis, mental illness, and anatomical comparisons in humans and other primates, as well as astronomy, meteorology, stresses in dam construction, inherited traits in poppies, and variance in sparrows' eggs. Pearson was described by G. U. Yule as a poet, essayist, historian, philosopher, and statistician, whose interests seemed limited only by the chance encounters of life. Colleagues remarked on his boundless energy and enthusiasm. Although some saw him as domineering and slow to admit errors, others praised him as an inspiring lecturer and noted his care in acknowledging the contributions of the members of his lab group. For Pearson, scientists were heroes. The walls of his laboratory contained quotations from Plato, Blaise Pascal, Huxley and others, including these words from Roger Bacon: "He who knows not Mathematics cannot know any other Science, and what is more cannot discover his own Ignorance or find its proper Remedies."
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