statistics sphinxradio are thrown around, hard facts, and we are supposed to make decisions based on the numbers. you can tell me what my chances are, and that the numbers never lie, but by the time you've calculated it all out, i might just not be listening anymore. what fun is free will, after all, if we live our lives according to logic? 011104 ... sotto voce 5 times out of 10, when I put my pen to paper I start writing about love. 10 times out of 10, i laugh at what i have written. 020305 ... reitoei i have a 50% chance of death if i ingest 10grams of caffiene. 6200 people will die in the US today.97% of the population can easy be mislead by misleading statistics. 93.5% of all statiscs are crap. SHS has a 3% dropout rate. I know way to many statisics. i used to have this cool book from the state health department that listed how many people died of what every year. 020306 ... misstree if you're going to quote statistics, realize that their value is diminished for each piece of information it *doesn't* have. using some of the stuff on fucked_another as an example, cheating statistics lose value when they don't include such information as definition of cheating, part of the world studies were conducted in and what kind of cross-section of humanity was sampled, method of information collecting (people may be more willing to admit things to a survey than an interviewer), year that studies were conducted, how questions were worded, and probably a million other factors that i'm not thinking of. sociological statistics are vague by nature, and they erase individuality. even stats in other realms are iffy--four out of five dentists may recommend Blest, but over what? not brushing? turpentine? economic sanctions may kill 5,000 people a month in some other country, but how are the economic sanctions determined to be a cause of death? malnutrition? lack of medical equipment? economic underdevelopment? so use them if you must, they are good when used as vague pointers, but be aware of their rather large flaws. 030910 ... minnesota_chris Very true. I want to know the why's, the stories in people's lives, rather than some vague number. 030910 ... stork daddy he was glad he hadn't been born a girl. he was already sensitive, and without male privilege to buoy him when he was down, he most likely would have attempted suicide. however, if statistics are to be trusted, he also would be less likely to succeed. 080208 what's it to you? who go blather from