"a smaller error" or " a lower error"

[sa_b]

Hi. I have some questions about adjectives of the word "error". Could you help me, please?

which one is correct? "a smaller error" or " a lower error"

And what about these: "a larger error" or "a greater error" or "a higher error"

 

[Boris Tatarenko]

Before anything else, could you tell me why you want to use an adjective in its comparative form?

You can use such adjectives as minor, small, major, large, great. I don't like "a high error", although native speakers might well think of some natural examples.

My answer is based on Oxford Collocations Dictionary that I forntunately have close at hand right now.

 

[sa_b]

I want to compare the error of two different methods.

 

[Matthew Wai]

A slight/serious error.

 

[sa_b]

Can you give us the sentence in which you wish to use the phrase?

Could you give me an advice?
It can be seen that the first method has ("a smaller" or "a lower") error compared to second method.

How about following sentence?
It can be seen that the first method has ("a larger" or "a higher" or "a larger" or "a greater") error compared to second method.

 

[Matthew Wai]

It can be seen that the first method has a smaller/greater error than the second method.

 

[sa_b]

It can be seen that the first method has a smaller/greater error than the second method.

Thanks for your help. I have another question. Is the phrase "compared to" wrong in my sentence? Why do you replace this phrase with "than"?

 

[Matthew Wai]

Because I don't think an error can be compared to a method.

 

[Matthew Wai]

I don't really see how one error can be smaller than another.

An error can be expressed as an amount or a number.

 

[Roman55]

Since we haven't been let into the secret of what the OP is actually talking about, we can only speculate.

It could be something to do with statistical analysis where the error is in fact a margin of error, or a standard deviation, in which case it can be higher or lower than another one.

 

[SoothingDave]

The number can be greater or lower. I don't think the error can be.

Sure it can.