Search

The author discusses the potential role of statistics in debates concerning whether the U.S. should respond to chemical attacks in Syria that have allegedly occurred as of September 2013, focusing on statistics concerning death counts and public opinion concerning chemical weapons.

The article examines the statistical difficulty of determining the gay population through the given surveys.

The article reports on the criticism against interpretation of criminal statistics compiled by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), which was used by CQ Press to rank cities in the U.S.

The article focuses on the statistical time-machine techniques developed by statisticians to answer various historical hypotheticals. It notes that the techniques were used by law professor Kevin Quinn and Andrew Martin of Washington University in Saint Louis, Missouri to track the ideological evolution of the judges. It mentions the capability of the techniques to help settle the debate between nostalgic sports spectators and those who insist that the tournaments have never been played better.

The author focuses on the 37th place ranking given by the World Health Organization (WHO) for the U.S. health-care system. He notes that the ranking has contributed to misconceptions about the quality of the medical system in the country. He cites that the ranking relies on statistics that are old and incomplete. He explains the reason why the WHO ranking was criticized.

This article discusses the statistical method applied by University of Michigan political science professor Walter Mebane to investigate the probability of fraud in the June 2009 presidential election in Iran. It explains that the method used by Mebane is based on the statistical law discovered by General Electric physicist Frank Benford. The results of Mebane's investigation suggested the existence of fraud in Iran's election.

This article focuses on the decision of the Parliament of Great Britain to approve the creation of the Statistics Authority in 2007. The Statistics Authority has the power and independence to question other government agencies on the statistics they release to the public. It explains that the Statistics Authority is now preparing to audit statistics on such topics as crime and education. The Statistics Authority is also determined to raise accountability among public officials and government agencies in Great Britain.

The author discusses a variety of number keeping devices throughout the world that attempt to show viewers a variety of statistics such as the world's population, the number of people with AIDS, the United States national debt, and rain forest acreage. The author points out the problems with such "clocks."