How to lie with Statistics Podcast #1

Posted by Carolyn Borock in Statistics - Miles - C on


This podcast is about the book How to Lie With Statistics by Darrell Huff Chapters 1-3.

Speakers: 
Carolyn Borock 
Alejandro Bautista-Garcia
Wilson Biggs 

Topics Discussed: 
- The bias between the numbers and how it wasn't accurate data to compare to the entire population. 
- What average means and how it's used. 
- The fact that it's so easy to mix numbers and lie with stats. 


Comments (1)

Mark Miles (Teacher)
Mark Miles

Good first podcast, but the discussion seemed a little light. There were some weird edits/cuts, and some of the background noises were a little distracting.

For next time, please respond to the following prompts:

  1. Choose one of the quotations inside the front cover and discuss how it relates to the Introduction.
  2. List as many sources of sample bias as you can that are mentioned in Chapter 1 and provide an example of each.
  3. Put the second paragraph on Page 18 (“A river cannot….”) into your own words.
  4. What is the advantage of a stratified random sample and what difficulties does it pose, according to this chapter?
  5. When we see an average reported, what do we need to ask besides which kind of average is being used? Why?

Finally, when discussing chapters 3, 5, or 6, incorporate the following article into your discussion:

http://gizmodo.com/how-to-lie-with-data-visualization-1563576606

Also, each member of your group should find an article online containing a misleading graph and discuss it during the podcast (be sure to talk about why it’s misleading!). Be sure to include a link to all articles in the text of your post of the podcast that corresponds to chapters 3, 5, or 6.