My (Very) Mini Rant

[Galethorn]

...and maybe even pirate universities...

And that would be different from a regular university...how? Between Limewire and Captain Morgan, I don't think there's much room for more piraticality.

In all seriousness, though, Mark Twain had it right;

There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.

 

[Yesminde]

Bleh, I recently did a blog post about bad statistics. I sometimes feel a desperate need to yell "CORRELATION IS NOT CAUSATION!" for no apparent reason.

 

[OakwoodDM]

In all seriousness, though, Mark Twain had it right;

That's an interesting quote. I had heard it was a quote from benjamin Disraeli, British Prime Minister, so I looked it up (using the terribly scientific method of googling it) and it turns out...well, quite possibly neither of us is right!

http://www1c.btwebworld.com/quote-unquote/p0000149.htm

The above website has a brief discussion of the origins of the phrase, and it comes down to Leonard Henry Courtney, an economist, attributing it to "the Wise Statesman" in a speech, which many (including Mark Twain) took to mean Disraeli, although there's no evidence of Disraeli himself ever saying it.

I agree, though, the way stats are used today they are next to useless. I remember a recent Kelloggs Cornflakes advert attempting to show that a bowl of cornflakes improves children's concentration by 9%.
The study involved was on something like 36 children who had a bowl of cornflakes compared to 12 children who had NO breakfast, and the concentration was based on parental assessment.

That's an impressive amount of bad stats practice in the one study.

 

[Atavar]

I remember years ago that both McDonalds and Burger King claimed to have "America's favorite french fries."

McDonald's based their claim on sales. More McDonald's french fries were sold than Burger King french fries (or any other kind of french fries, I imagine).

Burger King based their claim and taste tests. Their tests showed that people liked the taste of Burger King french fries better than the taste of McDonald's french fries.

So, in a way, they are both correct. They are just choosing their own methods of being correct. (However, I think McDonald's claim is stronger since it is easy to show high sales but difficult to show that your fries taste better than everyone else's, which is how I would define "favorite" based on taste tests).

And that's the same opinion I have about statistics. People use stats that agree with them; ignore, suppress or attack stats that don't; and manufacture stats that agree with them if they can't find any that do.

Thanks,

Atavar

"Over 98% of people die at some time during their lives." - Ricky Bobby

 

[Huw]

I've been looking at day lengths for the past few weeks, and I've noticed them getting shorter by a few minutes each day. By next June the daylight will have run out completely we'll be shrouded in perpetual night.

Some in Australia had noticed the opposite effect, but obviously their data're wrong