Interesting programme being shown on BBC 4 at the moment, called The Joy Of Stats.
I can think of a lot of people out there – driving instructors included – who could do with watching it, but I doubt that they would be able to pick it up on their current equipment. Instead, they’ll continue to copy-and-paste their favourite line about “lies, damned lies, and statistics” whenever they want to push their latest propaganda.
The only problem with any sort of statistic is the grey matter between the ears of the person trying to interpret it.
As a scientist by training it annoys me when people who don’t understand something become the ones who talk about it the most, and end up propagating lies and misinformation to other people who don’t know – but who might be in a better position to understand if they were fed the correct information.
The show will undoubtedly appear on iPlayer shortly.