To absolutely nobody's amazement, the problem is mine. Here's a
brief explanation.
Elsewhere in this thread I gave a summary of the contents of the 17
cells in the sum. When I entered 54 into one of the blank cells, the
value of the sum went up by exactly 100. I was interested in the effect
this 54 would have in the sum, so I was staring intently at the cell
containing the sum. What I didn't notice was that another value of the
17 also changed by, would you believe it, 46. (These are all figures
that are carried to two decimal places.)
I blame it on psychology. The change of an even 100 was so striking
that I was transfixed by it. I think that if the change had been
something like 89.21 I wouldn't have been in such a hurry to jump to the
conclusion of an Excel problem. Maybe not.
The only outstanding question now is: Why did I think I had
verified the error using my calculator? My memory of exactly what I did
with the calculator is gone, so I'm not going to pursue that.
Again, many thanks to those elected to waste their time on what was
obviously a mistake on my part from the very beginning.
Charlie
This is just one example of the inability or unwillingness of most
people to think scientifically or logically. While Microsoft has had
more than its share of bugs, it would be very surprising to find out
that simple addition has not been debugged by now.
One situation I ran into decades ago involved someone who was sure he
had found an error in Maxwell's equations. That is a theory that heavily
studied and central to our lives for over a century. The error was
traced back to the wrong sign in a commonly used optics book. This error
was corrected in a later edition.
Scientists love to find such discrepancies, if they are for real. It
gives them an opportunity for fame and fortune. Good scientists,
however, before making such claims, carefully examine their own work
before announcing or publishing. It is when they cut corners that s..t
happens.
The announcement of "cold fusion" was an extraordinary claim-- not fully
dead to this day. I have no idea how many millions or possibly billions
of dollars were spent tracking that down.
While adding numbers in a spreadsheet may not be so big a deal, it did
set off unneeded efforts. The main trouble with the original post was a
lack of any real data. That seems to be a common thread among self
deceptions.
--
Sam
Conservatives are against Darwinism but for natural selection.
Liberals are for Darwinism but totally against any selection.
23) ?