Statistics

He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lamp-posts … for support rather than illumination. –Andrew Lang

(when asked in the 1960s why the nation was so much better off in the days of Queen Victoria, the Chancellor of the Exchequer said:) Ah, back then, we didn’t have any statistics.

Arguments derived from probabilities are idle. –Plato

His focus on cancer clusters is called the “Texas sharpshooter fallacy” by statisticians: You empty your revolver into the side of a barn, then walk over and draw a bull’s-eye around each hole. Anecdotal evidence surrounds us—in newspaper headlines, in gossip among neighbors, in the courtroom. It doesn’t carry much weight with statisticians—if you’re going to argue from statistics, they will tell you, you must use all the statistics.

Once you’ve got the anecdote, you can throw away the data. –Dr. Richard Nisbett

The study compiled lots of data. “Data” is a Latin word meaning “the plural of anecdote.” --James D. Gordon, III

A single death is a tragedy; a million is a statistic. –Joseph Stalin

On my first visit to Professor [Milton] Friedman’s office, I was lamenting the fact that Cathy was so far away and that I could never possibly find a girl I loved as much in a small town like New York. “Benjy,” Professor Friedman said, “I can tell you as a statistician that if there were only one right woman for every man, they would never find each other. Go out and find someone else.” It was a flashing insight …. –Ben Stein

There are two kinds of statistics, the kind you look up and the kind you make up. –Rex Stout

Whenever you can, count. –Francis Galton

The favourite object of my life is the collecting of useful information. –Sir John Sinclair (who revolutionized farming in Scotland in the 18^th Century by compiling his famous Statistical Account of Scotland—a detailed survey of every farm and croft in the land. It took seven years, from 1790 to 1797, to complete and came in a bound volume, as valuable and comprehensive a work as England’s Domesday Book.

Numbers are kind of like a bikini—they show a lot, but not everything. –Marty Turco

Anything that can be measured can be improved. –Steve Bennett