Quotes About Statistics

Numbers may not lie, but individual perceptions of them differ.

American draft horses reached their highest number in 1915, at 21.4 million animals, but mule numbers peaked only in 1925 and 1926, at 5.9 million (USBC 1975).

Because the year has 8,760 hours, this average mortality prorates to 0.000001 or 1 × 10–6 deaths per person per hour of living. This means that the average additional chance of dying while flying is just 5/1,000th of the risk of simply being alive. Smoking risks are 100 times as high; ditto for driving in a car. In short, flying has never been safer.

primarily in Venezuela and Canada) that were previously excluded from annual summaries, the global total rose to 1.292Tb in 2005, and in 2017 it stood at 1.7Tb.

Ngram Viewer charts provide excellent illustrations of long-term

One objective fact is that in 1939 there were 28 million Ukrainians, compared with 31 million in 1926, at a time when (barring famine) the birth rate was often twice the death rate. Deaths are calculated on this basis at anywhere between 2.4 and 4 million. More sophisticated studies give a figure nearer to 5 million. OGPU's tally from December 1932 to mid-April 1933 give a figure of 2.4 million deaths from famine and cannibalism; by extrapolating these

What was all this? He knew only too well. The statistical method! Probability theory! There was a greater probability of finding enemies among people of a non-proletarian background. And it was on these same grounds – probability theory – that the German Fascists had destroyed whole peoples and nations. The principle was inhuman, blind and inhuman. There was only one acceptable way of relating to people – a human way.

There are roughly 28 million firms in the US, of which only 4% ever reach more than $1 million in revenue. Of those firms, only about one out of 10, or 0.4% of all companies, ever make it to $10 million in revenue, and only 17,000 companies surpass $50 million. Finishing out the list, the top 2,500 firms in the US are larger than $500 million, and the top 500 public and private firms exceed $5 billion. Data indicate that there are similar ratios in other countries.

third of all American residents currently on welfare live in California, as do a quarter of the nation's illegal aliens—a state where one in four was not born in the United States, but otherwise with just 12 percent of the population. A second force multiplier is that reds

less likely than native-born Americans to commit crimes.

Inside the opponent's 45-yard line, facing anything less than fourth and eight, teams are better off going for it than punting. Inside the opponent's 33-yard line, they are better off going for it on anything less than fourth and 11.* Regardless of field position, on anything less than fourth and five, teams are always better off going for it.

There are 350 varieties of shark, not counting loan and pool.

I'm doing everything that I can, working with experts, really studying the statistics to figure out a way we can make it cool or normal to be kind and loving.

99.99% of predictions have gone right so far about the stock market and it can be verified by old messages

There's a tremendous popular fallacy which holds that significant research can be carried out by trying things. Actually it is easy to show that in general no significant problem can be solved empirically, except for accidents so rare as to be statistically unimportant. One of my jests is to say that we work empirically -- we use bull's eye empiricism. We try everything, but we try the right thing first!

Physicians don't do the best for their patients because they: practice defensive medicine (Self-defense), do not understand health statistics (Innumeracy), or pursue profit instead of virtue (Conflicts of interest).

RISK: If risks are known, good decisions require logic and statistical thinking. UNCERTAINTY: If some risks are unknown, good decisions also require intuition and smart rules of thumb.

Always ask: What is the absolute risk increase?

Because these calculations generate precise numbers for an uncertain risk, they produce an illusory certainty.

bigger numbers make better headlines.

Wenn man mündige Bürger haben will, muss man ihnen drei Dinge beibringen: Lesen, Schreiben und – statistisches Denken.

you just can't use averages to predict the specifics of the next generation of eddies, any more than you could use an average to predict the life-story of an individual human being.

How lethal was it? It was twenty-five times more deadly than ordinary influenzas. This flu killed 2.5 percent of its victims. Normally, just one-tenth of 1 percent of people who get the flu die. And since a fifth of the world's population got the flu that year, including 28 percent of Americans, the number of deaths was stunning.

He estimates the number of deaths worldwide as 100 million, a larger number than the conventional estimate of 20 to 40 million. But, he said, 20 million people died in India alone, making it impossible for the 20 to 40 million figure to be correct.