BS: Innumeracy and Discussions

Subject: BS: Innumeracy and Discussions
From: saulgoldie
Date: 23 Apr 11 - 10:45 AM

When we discuss almost any idea, we use numbers. I assert that a large part of our confusion in discussions comes from a lack of understanding exactly what those numbers mean in real life.

Here are some recent numbers. $XX trillion over the next five years. XX million barrels of oil. $4 per gallon. XX hundred thousand jobs. XX thousand or million acres. XX million people with access/non-access to the Internet.

I could go on. But each number gives some information, and presumes some understanding of the number on the part of the receiver of the related numbers that are not expressed and how it translates to one's individual life.

Many/most people do not understand the complete number picture, and many do not even recognize distinctions of where the decimal point is located. I don't know how to handle this in discussions, much less how to insist on "more honest" use of numbers. I just know that confusion over exactly what is happening exists for many people. And that confusion is sometimes inadvertent, but more often cynically exploited by the person delivering the numbers and designed to confuse.

Saul

Subject: RE: BS: Innumeracy and Discussions
From: GUEST,999
Date: 23 Apr 11 - 11:08 AM

Twain remarked on exactly that, Saul.

`Lies, damned lies and statistics.`

Subject: RE: BS: Innumeracy and Discussions
From: Rapparee
Date: 23 Apr 11 - 12:09 PM

Spending, say, 20 billion dollars over the next twenty years sounds like a much larger number that one billion dollars a year. Moreover, such "truths" do not take into consideration other sociological and demographical figures such a population increase or decrease, is this a worst or best case scenario, etc.

Subject: RE: BS: Innumeracy and Discussions
From: pdq
Date: 23 Apr 11 - 12:31 PM

Since the 2010 elections, the US federal government has spent $1.00 for every 57¢ it has taken in.

The other 43¢ is borrowed money that future generations will pay interest on.

If a business were being run this way the executives would (hopefully) all be facing time in federal prison.

Subject: RE: BS: Innumeracy and Discussions
From: Greg F.
Date: 23 Apr 11 - 12:52 PM

Since the 2010 elections, the US federal government has spent $1.00 for every 57¢ it has taken in.

And if the tax structure were restored to what it was pre-Reagan and the following 30 years of Voodoo Economics and de-regulation- which put the country and the economy in the toilet it now occupies- this statistic would be reversed ten times over.

Subject: RE: BS: Innumeracy and Discussions
From: gnu
Date: 23 Apr 11 - 01:32 PM

Greg F... Ya can't build a death ray on an earth orbiting platform, rail guns, xray and chemical lasers, MX missiles... and so on and so on... without pissing on someone. That's Rrickle Down theory. Don't you feel all safe and warm and fuzzy?

Subject: RE: BS: Innumeracy and Discussions
From: DMcG
Date: 24 Apr 11 - 03:15 AM

Getting off topic a bit quickly, aren't we? *smile*

The point is surely how presentation and people's general lack of understanding nof numbers can add fuel to the sorts of arguments listed above. There's a column in the UK guardian called 'Bad Science' which writes a lot on this topic and online versions can be found here

Subject: RE: BS: Innumeracy and Discussions
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 24 Apr 11 - 09:07 AM

I never use the terms billions and trillions nowadays as they're ambiguous, and when you see them quoted, they always seem to be 'short'.

Subject: RE: BS: Innumeracy and Discussions
From: ollaimh
Date: 24 Apr 11 - 04:09 PM

i say for the billionth and trillionth time--i don't like counting!!that's why i went to law school. i thought i'd never see another formula again--they didn't warn me about tax law!!

Subject: RE: BS: Innumeracy and Discussions
From: GUEST,999
Date: 24 Apr 11 - 04:52 PM

``If a business were being run this way the executives would (hopefully) all be facing time in federal prison.``

Yeah. Like bank executives and real estate execs, right, pdq. What`s the difference. You said no such thing when they were bailed out. What`s changed.

Subject: RE: BS: Innumeracy and Discussions
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 25 Apr 11 - 11:57 AM

G. Gordon Liddy appeared at our university shortly after he got out of federal prison in the early '80s.

He spoke, among other things, about the Federal budget of the day. To illustrate its size, he asked the very large assembly of students and faculty the following question:

"If I gave you a thousand dollars every day, about how many years would it take for you to collect a million dollars? Roughly."

After about thirty seconds, somebody shouted out "Three years!"

Liddy was pleased. Then he asked, "If I gave you a thousand dollars a day, roughly how many years would it take till you had a *billion* dollars?"

There was a longer pause. Lots of guesses. Most were "Ten years!" "A hundred years!" He had to repeat the question. Finally someone correctly called out "Three thousand years!" in an uncertain tone.

When Liddy raised the ante to a *trillion* dollars, there was complete silence until somebody said "Thirty thousand years!" Then they gave up.

These were university people. (I assume that any math professors in the audience didn't want to hog the spotlight.) Meanwhile, I'm still waiting for my thousand dollars a day.

Subject: RE: BS: Innumeracy and Discussions
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 25 Apr 11 - 11:38 PM

If I've told you once, I've told you a million times, Don't Exaggerate!

I remember a 'Pete and Dud' (I think) routine, where they were talking about things with numbers, that were totally beyond their understanding and memory, would like to track it down again.

Went like...

Did you know that if you put, oh, an incredibly large number of cars end to end out in space, it would stretch out, oh, er, an incredibly long distance...

Subject: RE: BS: Innumeracy and Discussions
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 26 Apr 11 - 02:58 AM

Sometimes in these discusions it is claimed that "you can prove anything with stats". This is of course not true.

People lie with stats just as they do with words but as people in general are less numerate than they are literate it is easy to lie with numbers.

Because we spend of time speaking and listening and not much counting and doing sums?

L in C#
HNC Suplimentary Maths

Subject: RE: BS: Innumeracy and Discussions
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 26 Apr 11 - 10:34 AM

Here's a kind of innumeracy I see everywhere.

"X percent of Y is Z." This kind of statistic is often quoted by people who are trying to prove something, but even if the statistic is true, it doesn't even begin to prove anything. To know whether that statistic has any significance, you also have to know "what percent of non-Y is Z?". Often this bit of information is missing from the argument entirely.

For instance (I'm making up these numbers):

"10 percent of everyone who drinks Coca-Cola dies of cancer within 10 years." Does that constitute evidence that drinking Coca-Cola causes cancer? Not at all. You also have to answer the question, "What about the people who do not drink Coca-Cola? How many of them die of cancer in any 10 year period?" If, say, the answer is 5 percent, then you have a plausible argument (which is not proof) that drinking Coca-Cola causes cancer. On the other hand, if the answer is 20 percent, then you have equally good (or bad) evidence that drinking Coca-Cola prevents cancer. But without that other number, you have nothing at all.

Subject: RE: BS: Innumeracy and Discussions
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 26 Apr 11 - 11:14 AM

Another good innumerate weasel word is "average."

"Average" income can refer to the mean, the median, or the mode, which can be three very different figures, all possibly implying something equally important from different perspectives.

Subject: RE: BS: Innumeracy and Discussions
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 26 Apr 11 - 11:18 AM

And, of course, many people will say "the average X" when all they mean is "the sort of X that I feel (without giving any evidence) is typical."

Subject: RE: BS: Innumeracy and Discussions
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 26 Apr 11 - 11:24 AM

Another thing is that there are two very different meanings for billion and trillion - the one that's current in the USA and teh one that used to be current elsewhere. The American usage has now been taken up in Britain as the one normally used, but not always, and not in all countries.

The difference is that the American billion is only 1,000 million, whereas the more traditional meaning is one million million. The other word for the American billion is "milliard", but that seems to have dropped out of usage.

Subject: RE: BS: Innumeracy and Discussions
From: saulgoldie
Date: 26 Apr 11 - 01:12 PM

Also, we don't know what else the Coke drinkers might be doing that contributes to their cancer. It might be the coke. Or it might be that these coke drinkers are all putting Cap'n Morgan in the drink, and the good Cap'n is causing the cancer. Or it could be another factor, altogether. Perhaps those coke drinkers are adding rum, having several of these concoctions, and then having risky sexual encounters and THAT is what is causing the cancer. Not that I am a huge fan of Coke in general. I'm just saying...

Besides, it is a well-known fact that 78% of all statistics are made up on the spot.

Saul

Subject: RE: BS: Innumeracy and Discussions
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 26 Apr 11 - 01:32 PM

Unless backed by a specific source, my statistics are 100% made up on the spot.

One reason it seems easy to "lie with statistics" is that a statistic is impressive: it suggests you know your subject in detail even when you don't.

Statistics can only prove things when they start to fall together in patterns. The more consistent the pattern, the more probable the conclusion. But a lonesome statistic doesn't prove any more than a lonesome fact. A simple statement proves nothing; detailed patterns prove things.