Which numbers and figures do you trust? - Math is hard, especially for lolcows and large political organizations

[Glad I couldn't help]

Note, I am open for additional options.

 

[AgriDrThunder]

fuck this is a tough one

 

[NOT Sword Fighter Super]

Numbers are science, and science is lies.
They can't even tell me how magnets work.

 

[Some Manajerk]

I don't even trust my own counts without triple checking them, and you want me to trust someone else's?

 

[verissimus]

@Glad I couldn't help

War is peace,
Freedom is slavery,
Ignorance is strength!

 

[Positron]

41%

 

[Exigent Circumcisions]

I can tell you which one I don't trust: one.


Never trust a loner, they're invariably incel mass shooters.

 

[???]

The number 47 is of especial portent, though not often trustworthy. 12 should always be trusted. 27 is friendly but deceptive. 85 is safe and reliable in a crisis. 17 is either excellent or terrible, with nothing in-between.

The figure [undecipherable noise] is drawn by scholars of Borges' esoteric recordings to reveal the true meaning of his work, but the price is such that few willingly undertake such travails.

 

[Stranger Neighbors]

I'm really fond of the number 2

 

[Silver Chariot]

13s that fall on Fridays

 

[Ughubughughughughughghlug]

The ones that agree with me.

 

[soft kitty]

I generally take facts & figures at face value unless I have a reason to distrust them; like statistics being manipulated to serve a particular agenda, especially if that agenda is left-wing. For example, Vox pointing to a greater disparity in police violence towards blacks relative to their population as evidence of systemic racism; when really all that is evidence of is black people committing crimes at a higher rate relative to their population. Or DSP blatantly lying on his Bankruptcy forms.

 

[Y2K Baby]

Ones with 11.

 

[Doctor Placebo]

Always, always, always check the source. Manipulating numbers is easy, and people who are smart about it will avoid outright lying. A biased source hasn't necessarily fudged the numbers, but unless you can get a detailed rundown of their methodology from a third party, they shouldn't be trusted on their own. See if independent studies back them up, and then consider if those studies have a bias as well. When people on opposite sides of an issue agree on the numbers, there's a good chance those numbers are solid. Third party sources that don't have a dog in that particular fight are also great for confirming things.

This is why when people ask if RT is a reliable source, I say it's not trustworthy about shit that interests Russia, but for anything that doesn't interest Russia it's probably a better source for honest reporting than most western media. Western media is completely partisan while RT is only partisan within a much more narrow area.

 

[Pissmaster]

Boogie2988: As trustworthy as the Chinese government.

 

[Agent Abe Caprine]

The numbers need to gain my trust first.

 

[Otterly]

I don’t trust the numbers coming out of China. They don’t even have correct numbers if they did want to report accurately, because of how they are doing death certificates, lack of testing kits etc. They don’t know how many have died outside hospital and they don’t know how many have it outside hospital.
I’d put more trust in numbers from (most) other countries. However, always check your data, regardless of source. Even well intentioned data can be wrong, or poorly interpreted, because most people are t great with numbers (and ahem, biologists and medics are particularly bad...)
That cruise ship will be an interesting real world experiment, let’s put it that way.
Once data from multiple countries is in, we can get some solid guesses on how it works. That will be March/April at the earliest.

 

[byuu]

Always, always, always check the source. Manipulating numbers is easy, and people who are smart about it will avoid outright lying.

Extremely easy. Objective unbiased data is harder to produce than manipulated/biased data.

Everyone should read the classic How to Lie with Statistics, which goes over basic ways numbers can lie to you - a free digital version is on archive.org.

 

[Niggernerd]

The ones that make up the anime girls sprites.