Is There a Simple Quantitative Technique for Projecting Values in a Series?

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    Extrapolation Formulae
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AA Institute
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Hi,

Is there a general extrapolation formula (or other *simple* quantitative technique) for projecting values in a given series?

I have these numbers in a certain series sequence:

x=1, y=-3.80, x=2, y=-4.15, x=3, y=-4.47, x=4, y=-4.77, x=5, y=-5.05, x=6, y=-5.27, -5.40

Question is: does y converge to a definite final value? What is that value likely to be? I would guess somewhere around -6.0, but I want to know with more precision.

Thanks for any pointers.

AA
 
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Question is: does y converge to a definite final value? What is that value likely to be? I would guess somewhere around -6.0, but I want to know with more precision.
Given this data (values of y at a discrete set of x's), there is no mathematical answer to your question. If you were to graph it, you might see some useful trend. A polynomial fit is probably a bad idea, since it will very likely give you fluctuations that are not there.