Minimum and Maximum of a list containing floating point numbers

[ceycey]

I have a list like ['1.1881', '1.1881', '1.1881', '1.1881', '1.1881',
'1.1881', '1.1881', '1.1881', '1.1881', '1.1881', '1.7689',  '1.7689',
'3.4225', '7.7284', '10.24', '9.0601', '9.0601', '9.0601', '9.0601',
'9.0601']. What I want to do is to find minimum  and maximum number in
this list.

I used min function,

s = ['1.1881', '1.1881', '1.1881', '1.1881', '1.1881', '1.1881',
'1.1881', '1.1881', '1.1881', '1.1881', '1.7689',
'1.7689', '3.4225', '7.7284', '10.24', '9.0601', '9.0601', '9.0601',
'9.0601', '9.0601']

print min(s)
print max(s)

these gives me

1.181
9.0601

maximum value is wrong. It must be 10.24.

I know why max function gives wrong number. Because max function
processed elements of list as strings. How can I convert the elements
of list to float so max function finds the correct answer.

I hope I can explain my problem.

Cuneyt.