The survey led to the first international scientific conference, in 1799, to consider collaboratively the evidence produced by Delambre and Méchain and to decide on the definitive length. Ironically, the survey produced a set of errors which, because of their importance, formed an important stage on the way to the invention of sophisticated statistics, which are discussed later in this chapter.6 The length the two men calculated for the circumference of the earth differs from modern-day satellite surveys by less than eight pages of this book.
