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Yes, why not?

When you use the mean, you are secretly assuming that the thing you are calculating the mean of is continuous (i.e. it can take non-whole number value). If you don't know why, you'll have to trust me!

If you are calculating something such as the mean number of teachers in a number of schools, it doesn't really make sense for you to calculate that there are 30.3 teachers - after all, what is 0.3 of a teacher?.

The point is that you have to think about the numbers, rather than blindly calculate them. Maybe the value you want is 30.3; maybe the value you want is 30, or 31, or something else. You have to understand what it is you calculate in order for it to make any sense at all.

If the number you calculate doesn't make sense, question whether you are calculating the correct number: should you be calculating the median or mode, or something entirely different?

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15y ago

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