best way to become a "Numerati"?
mechanical_fish: You need to ask a biologist, a sociologist, or an epidemiologist.Or you could take up statistical process control. Useful skill, and applicable to many things besides semiconductor manufacturing. Here's a hilarious quote that I've remembered for years, from http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/2003/pulpit_20030925_0004..."I taught over 300 courses for industry where we designed cars and electronic devices, but it wasn't until one day I took over my wife's kitchen and used Taguchi to perfect my recipe for vanilla wafer cookies that I realized how broadly it could be applied," Kowalick recalls. "It took 16 batches, but by the end of the afternoon I had those wafers dialed in."Go forth and bake some cookies.