I was saddened to hear a few days ago that the eminent statistician David Cox has passed away at the age of 97. I didn’t know Professor Cox personally – I met him only once, at a joint astronomy-statistics meeting at (I think) the Royal Astronomical Society back in the day – but I learnt a huge amount from books he co-wrote, despite the fact that he was of the frequentist persuasion. Three examples from my bookshelf are shown above.
I started my PhD DPhil in 1985 with virtually no formal study of statistics under my belt so I had to follow a steep learning curve and I was helped enormously by these books. I bought the book on Point Processes so as to understand some of the ideas being applied to galaxy clustering. It’s only a short book but it’s crammed with interesting ideas. Cox & Miller on Stochastic Processes is likewise a classic.
I know I’m not the only person in astrophysics whose career has been influenced by David Cox and I’m sure there are many other disciplines who have benefitted from his knowledge.
Among many other awards, David Cox was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1973 and knighted in 1985.
Rest in peace Sir David Cox (1924-2022)
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