Proofiness: How You're Being Fooled by the Numbers, (Paperback)

from sjjk

The book starts with a fantastic quote: Dewey Defeats Truman." It's an iconic picture. Harry Truman, grinning with uncharacteristic glee, holds the Chicago Daily Tribune up for all to see. "That is one for the books," he gloated. The headline was a colossal screw-up, even by newspaper standards. ...

from rivkat

This is a book about the misuse of math, particularly statistics, in public life, covering politics, elections (voting and apportionment), criminal trials (including the death penalty), and various other topics. I found it quite readable—the whole point is that you don’t need to know ...

from libri_amor

Proofiness is a particularly enlightening book and a must read for any discerning citizen in our democracy. As author Charles Seife explains, proofiness is the art of using bogus mathematical arguments. This book is a virtual catalog of bogus argument techniques. All having the common thread of u...

from libri_amor

Proofiness is a particularly enlightening book and a must read for any discerning citizen in our democracy. As author Charles Seife explains, proofiness is the art of using bogus mathematical arguments. This book is a virtual catalog of bogus argument techniques. All having the common thread of u...

from themulhern

Rather a good book, but it needed a better editor. "as many as 5% of the people who are on death row are not guilty of the crime they committed" is not what the author intended, surely. He invents or formalizes some good catch phrases for the different kinds of deception he describes: Potemkin nu...