Оскар Иоганн Виктор Андерсон
economist mathematician scientist statistician
Anderson was born on August 2, 1887 to a German family in Minsk (now in Belarus), but soon moved to Kazan (Russia). His father, Nikolai Anderson, was professor in Finno-Ugric languages at the University of Kazan. His older brothers were the folklorist Walter Anderson and the astrophysicist Wilhelm Anderson.
After studying for one term at the mathematical faculty of Kazan University, Anderson entered the economics faculty of the Petersburg Poly technical Institute in 1907. He graduated in 1912 as a candidate in economics. His dissertation, in which he developed the variance-difference method for analyzing time series, was published in Biometrika (1914) almost simultaneously with similar work by W. S. Gosset.
Anderson was a pupil and an assistant of A. A. Tschuprow and always, even during the general excessive enthusiasm aroused by Karl Pearson’s methods, considered himself a representative of the “Continental direction” of mathematical statistics exemplified by Lexis, Bortkiewicz, and Tschuprow.
From 1912 until he left Russia in 1920, Anderson taught in commercial colleges at St. Petersburg and Kiev, and engaged in research. He participated in a study of the agriculture of Turkestan in 1915 using sampling methods - he was a pioneer in this field - and worked at the Demographical Institute of the Kiev Academy of Sciences in 1918.
After he left Russia, Anderson spent four years in Hungary, continuing his pedagogic and scientific activities. From 1924 to 1942 he lived in Bulgaria, where he was extraordinary professor of statistics and economic geography at the Varna Commercial College until 1929 and full professor from then on; a member of the Supreme Scientific Council of the Central Board of Statistics; and from 1935 director of the Statistical Institute of Economic Researches of Sofia University. Anderson was engaged mainly in the application of statistics to economics, and published a review of the general status of Bulgarian economics (1938). Subsequent economical-statistical investigations in Bulgaria were always conducted in the spirit of Andersonian traditions, and in this sense he founded a school in that country. Anderson also became internationally known: he published a primer (1935), delivered lectures at the London School of Economics in 1936, and was an adviser to the League of Nations and a charter member of the Econometric Society.
In 1942 Anderson accepted a professorship at the University of Kiel; from 1947 until his death he held the chair of statistics at the economics faculty of the University of Munich and was the recognized leader of West German statisticians. His pedagogic activities resulted in higher standards of statistical education for student economists in West Germany.
Anderson remained in Munich for the rest of his life. At the time of his death on February 12, 1960, in Munich, Germany, his authority in German statistical circles was unrivaled.
Oskar Anderson`s scientific work was always marked by personal involvement and some of Anderson's endeavors were ahead of his time. His emphasis on casual analysis of non-experimental data is a reminder that this important sector of applied statistics is far less developed than descriptive statistics and experimental analysis. The main strength of Anderson's scientific work lied in the systematic coordination of theory and application. Besides developing the variance-difference method, Anderson did research in the quantity theory of money and in the index-number theory from the statistical viewpoint. Seeing no significant advantage in the application of classical mathematics to economics, he advocated the application of mathematical statistics.
Anderson believed that the application of statistics distinguished modern economics from economics based on Robinson Crusoe theories and the homo oeconomicus. Anderson especially believed that statistics, based on the law of large numbers and the sorting out of random deviations, is the only substitute for experimentation, which is impossible in economics. Sensibly estimating the difficulties in herent in economics as a science, Anderson was opposed to the use of “refined” statistical methods and to accepting preconditions regarding laws of distribution. This led him to nonparametric methods and to the necessity of causal analysis in economics.
Anderson was an honorary member of the Royal and West German Statistical Societies, the International Statistical Institute, a charter member of the Econometric Society, and the American Statistical Association.
Quotes from others about the person
Tintner describes Anderson as "perhaps the most widely known statistician in Central Europe". He goes on to write that:
"... through his origin in the flourishing Russian school of probability, ... Anderson belongs to the so-called "continental" school of statistics, and worked in the tradition of Lexis and Bortkiewicz. He might be the last representative of this approach ...."
Anderson was married to Margarethe Natalie von Hindenburg. He left Russia in 1920 with his family; they were effectively refugees. The political turbulence that occurred in Russia in 1920s had a dramatic effect on Anderson's life. He lost three children over the following period, first a daughter, then a little while later a son, and finally a second son died serving in World War II.
He was a professor in Finno-Ugric languages at the University of Kazan.
Walter Arthur Alexander Anderson was a German ethnologist (folklorist) and numismatist.
