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The soup analogy is,

You only need a single spoon to sample the soup, provided it is well stirred.

It has been used several times here Sampling distributions of sample means and What is your favorite layman's explanation for a difficult statistical concept?. It is also referenced on other websites, for example Soup analogy. It has a corollary that "if the soup is not well stirred, a single spoonful may not be representative."

What is the origin of this aphorism? The linked answer above finds in in Behar, R., Grima, P., & Marco-Almagro, L. (2012). Twenty Five Analogies for Explaining Statistical Concepts. The American Statistician But that paper surely isn't the origin of the saying. I remember it from a university lecture in the 1990s, and even then it was treated as a proverbial saying. Who first said this, and roughly when? What was the original quote?

James K
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    According to https://nrich.maths.org/13895 it's due to George Gallup. – user2974951 Apr 03 '23 at 12:25
  • Thanks, that leads me to https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=2194&dat=19411127&id=l-0uAAAAIBAJ&sjid=VtsFAAAAIBAJ&pg=4887,5489739&hl=en which mentions the analogy in 1941, in the context of Gallup. But that's still at some remove from the original quote. – James K Apr 03 '23 at 12:52
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    One of the challenges of statistics as a novel science, is that it's very hard to predict the emergence of well-defined notions, so remarks like the above aren't followed with quite as much fervor as the trends de jour would dictate. Many quotations fall this way. Remarks like "Just report the CI and be done with it", "They should call it [the bootstrap] 'the shotgun' because it blows the head off any problem provided you're willing to pick up the pieces" and "God does not play dice" live on, in altered forms, with precise sources uncertain, even when the attributed is known - and living! – AdamO Apr 07 '23 at 17:44

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This saying is credit to George Gallup. It dates from before 1941, though I've not been able to find a primary source. It seems likely that he used the analogy multiple times.

For example the Ottawa Citizen writes:

When a cook want to taste the soup to see how it is coming he doesn't have to drink the whole boilerful, nor does he take a spoonful from the top then a bit from the middle and some from the bottom. He stirs the whole cauldron thouroughly, then he stirs it some more, then he tastes it.

This doesn't claim to be an exact quote, but seems to be indicative of how Gallup made the analogy. It is presented in the context of George Gallup, but not as a quote. Given the early date of this article it is possible that was, in fact, Gregory Clark who came up with the idea. But given the range of other sources pointing to Gallup, one can surmise that Gallup had used the analogy either in his interview with Clarke, or it was in the background reading on Gallup that Clarke did before the interview.

As an aside - this article is dated Nov 27th 1941, 10 days before the USA joined the second world war. Look to the top right of the page for a short story on how "Pearl Harbour would be in grave danger of sabotage, if the US become involve in a war in the Pacific". It is one column tucked away on page 18. The lead story that day "Seige of Tobruk Broken".

James K
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