Hidden variables may refer to:
- Hidden variable theories, in physics, the proposition that statistical models of physical systems (such as Quantum Mechanics) are inherently incomplete, and that the apparent randomness of a system depends not on collapsing wave functions, but rather due to unseen or unmeasurable (and thus "hidden") variables. In sharp contrast to the generally accepted Copenhagen Interpretation.
- Latent variables, in statistics, variables that are inferred from other observed variables
- Hidden transformation, in computer science, a way to transform a generic constraint satisfaction problem into a binary one by introducing new hidden variables
- Confounding or hidden variables in general. That is, a variable that actually creates the illusion of a causal relation (e.g. firemen often appear after smoke, not because smoke causes firemen, but because fire causes both smoke and firemen)
Famous quotes containing the words hidden and/or variables:
“When a thing is funny, search it for a hidden truth.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)
“The variables are surprisingly few.... One can whip or be whipped; one can eat excrement or quaff urine; mouth and private part can be meet in this or that commerce. After which there is the gray of morning and the sour knowledge that things have remained fairly generally the same since man first met goat and woman.”
—George Steiner (b. 1929)