Higher order statistics from the Edinburgh Durham Southern Galaxy Catalogue Survey .1. Counts in cells

Counts in cells are used to analyze the higher order properties of the statistics of the Edinburgh/Durham Southern Galaxy Catalogue Survey (EDSGC). The probability distribution is obtained from an equal area projection source catalog with infinite oversampling over the range 0.015 degrees-2 degrees. The factorial moments of the resulting distribution and the s(N)'s characterizing the non-Gaussian nature of the distribution are extracted. These results are compared to previous results from the Automatic Plate Measuring Facility (APM) survey and to theoretical results from perturbation theory. The deprojected three-dimensional values corresponding to the s(N)'s are also determined. We find that the three-dimensional values match the scaling relation for strongly nonlinear clustering found in N-body simulations remarkably well, which suggests that the galaxies are reliable tracers of the underlying mass distribution.