Standard Deviations: Flawed Assumptions, Tortured Data, and Other Ways to Lie with Statistics
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Book Overview
As Nobel Prize-winning economist Ronald Coase once cynically observed, "If you torture data long enough, it will confess." Lying with statistics is a time-honored con. In Standard Deviations, economics professor Gary Smith walks us through the various tricks and traps that people use to back up their own crackpot theories. Sometimes, the unscrupulous deliberately try to mislead us. Other times, the well-intentioned are blissfully unaware of the mischief they are committing. Today, data is so plentiful that researchers spend precious little time distinguishing between good, meaningful indicators and total rubbish. Not only do others use data to fool us, we fool ourselves.
With the breakout success of Nate Silver's The Signal and the Noise, the once humdrum subject of statistics has never been hotter. Drawing on breakthrough research in behavioral economics by luminaries like Daniel Kahneman and Dan Ariely and taking to task some of the conclusions of Freakonomics author Steven D. Levitt, Standard Deviations demystifies the science behind statistics and makes it easy to spot the fraud all around.
London Times Book of the Week (2014)
Format:Paperback
Language:English
ISBN:1468311026
ISBN13:9781468311020
Release Date:July 2015
Publisher:Harry N. Abrams
Length:336 Pages
Weight:0.75 lbs.
Dimensions:0.9" x 5.4" x 8.0"
Age Range:18 years and up
Grade Range:Grade 12 and higher
Related Subjects
Math Mathematics Probability & Statistics Psychology Science & Math Social Science Social SciencesCustomer Reviews
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