At the start of this Introduction we asked “What is Statistics? What is Data Science? What is Analytics?” To deal with Analytics first, this is a term now used in business circles as a substitute for the word Statistics, but it really means the same thing. The word Statistics is considered by some people, especially businessmen, as a bit old-fashioned, and sometimes even difficult to pronounce! But don’t be fooled: Analytics is a fancy word for Statistics.

When it comes to Data Science, however, the term does have some different meaning. Data Science is a field that includes Statistics as well as areas such as Computer Science, Database Management and Data Visualization, for example, and has come into being mainly as a result of the spectacular growth in the amount of available data in this new information world that we live in.