Episode 0008: Misuse of statistics, and misunderstanding of randomness and probability

Misuse of statistics

_________________

Clip from original episode

A bit from the classic British show, Yes Prime Minister.

_________________

Apple WWDC keynote 

Apple CEO Tim Cook at this year’s World Wide Developers Conference Keynote. He points out that Apple has an install base of 80 Million Macs.

Based on NetMarketShare data, as of May 2014, Windows 8 can be found on about 14 percent of all PCs currently running Windows. But with an overall market share of about 1.5 billion, Windows PCs represent nearly 91 percent of all computers in use worldwide. In simple terms, that means that Windows 8, widely considered a “failure” by critics and competitors, is in use on about 210 million PCs worldwide. That’s more than 5 times the install base of Mavericks, and more than 2.5 times the install base of every Mac currently in use. (Source: http://www.tekrevue.com/windows-8-outpaces-os-x-mavericks/)

This also ignores other points of difference. Windows 8 is a major update that pretty much people only get with new machines and have to pay for. Maveriicks is a minor free upgrade by comparison.

Full keynote: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w87fOAG8fjk

_________________

Andrew Bolt and climate contrarians 

Analysis of this factoid:

• http://reneweconomy.com.au/2013/andrew-bolt-damned-statistics-and-climate-change-41323 
• http://grogsgamut.blogspot.com.au/2013/02/andrew-bolt-trends-towards-dodgy-graphs.html 
• http://www.skepticalscience.com/global-warming-stopped-in-1998-intermediate.htm 

Original Youtube clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3NDfwkr8hig
_________________

Misunderstanding of probability

_________________

Sally Clark wrongful conviction 

From a Ted Talk by Peter Donnelly. http://www.ted.com/talks/peter_donnelly_shows_how_stats_fool_juries# 

Background - Wikipedia on Sally Clark: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sally_Clark
_________________

Evolution and spontaneous beginning of life

From URCall.org, a community of Christians sharing their ideas about the relationship between faith and science.

Original Youtube clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-0AksTzfx0

Fred Hoyle's junkyard tornado: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Junkyard_tornado
_________________


Book I’m part of the way through reading: How to not be wrong: http://www.jordanellenberg.com/how-not-to-be-wrong/

Direct download of the episode: https://archive.org/download/HH101/HH101e0008.mp3
_________________


The Second (eBook) Edition of Humbug! is available for about US$3.99 from:

• Amazon (Kindle)
• Google Play 
• Apple iBooks
• LULU (DRM free ePub)