8. There are good grounds for considering the idea of mean as balance point as an
interpretation. This interpretation figures centrally in mechanics, where the mean is a
measure of center of mass. But in the statistics texts that we examined, the idea of mean as balance point seemed to be used solely as a way to visualize the location of the mean in a distribution of values and not as an interpretation as we have defined it.
9. We have to be careful using this logic. For example, mean income would be a different, and probably better, indicator of the power of the economic system to take care of its citizens if the wealth were in fact distributed equally.