How to lie with statistics

[EternalOptimist]

A great book, but has anyone ever come across an example close up and personal ?

I knew a guy who would put his slides on the OHP at an angle to make the flat slope look like it was going up. A Scottish service manager who produced his stats including bank holidays from Glasgow or edinburgh, which were different. So he would get a 5% boost more often than the English guys.

Nothing Tesco-esque, but definitely telling porkies via the numbers

[BolshieBastard]

Im all for making life simpler, why complicate things with stats? Just ******* lie!

[MarillionFan]

1 out of 10 people think I'm funny

EternalOptimist.

Which we all know is a lie. It's zero.

[TestMangler]

10% of road accidents are caused by driving after alcohol consumption.

That means we could cut road accidents by 90% by eradicating sober driving.

[EternalOptimist]

10% of road accidents are caused by driving after alcohol consumption.

That means we could cut road accidents by 90% by eradicating sober driving.

heh heh.

and 75% of traffic collisions are speed related
the other 25% are caused by cars not moving

[OwlHoot]

A great book, but has anyone ever come across an example close up and personal ?

I knew a guy who would put his slides on the OHP at an angle to make the flat slope look like it was going up. A Scottish service manager who produced his stats including bank holidays from Glasgow or edinburgh, which were different. So he would get a 5% boost more often than the English guys.

Nothing Tesco-esque, but definitely telling porkies via the numbers

Saw a blatant example a few years ago - A bar graph where the taller bars were also wider in proportion, and seen obliquely so they looked much bigger by volume than their height difference alone would indicate.

Having recently bought Would They Lie to You, I'd probably recommend it. But would I lie to you? I haven't yet got round to reading it.

[VectraMan]

Graphs with y-axes that don't start from zero always annoy me. It makes a small change look like a much more dramatic doubling, or something. Has anyone ever seen a climate change graph starting at zero kelvins? The resulting near enough straight line would have made it much harder to convince anybody of anything.

[OwlHoot]

Graphs with y-axes that don't start from zero always annoy me. It makes a small change look like a much more dramatic doubling, or something. Has anyone ever seen a climate change graph starting at zero kelvins? The resulting near enough straight line would have made it much harder to convince anybody of anything.

Fancy 3D-effect graphs with an oblique "partly sideways" view (see my post above) can increase the apparent steepness even more.

[stek]

10% of road accidents are caused by driving after alcohol consumption.

That means we could cut road accidents by 90% by eradicating sober driving.

RIP Dave Allen....

[RSoles]

And of course, nearly half of the population is of below average intelligence.