Lies, damned lies, and statistics
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This well-known saying is part of a phrase attributed to Benjamin Disraeli and popularized in the U.S. by Mark Twain: There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics. The semi-ironic statement refers to the persuasive power of numbers, and succinctly describes how even accurate statistics can be used to bolster inaccurate arguments.
Twain ascribed the saying to Disraeli in "Chapters from My Autobiography," published in the North American Review, No. DCXVIII., July 5, 1907. "Figures often beguile me," Twain wrote, "particularly when I have the arranging of them myself; in which case the remark attributed to Disraeli would often apply with justice and force: 'There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.'" [1]
Recent research indicates that neither Disraeli nor Twain actually coined the phrase. Alternative attributions include the radical journalist and politician Henry Du Pré Labouchère (1831-1912), and Leonard H. Courtney, who used the phrase in 1895 and two years later became the president of the Royal Statistical Society. There is some doubt, however, as to what Courtney intended the phrase to mean.[2]
Recently however, attention has been drawn to a use of the phrase in 1892 by Cornelia Augusta Hewitt Crosse (1827-1895). In 1894 a doctor called M Price read a paper to the Philadelphia County Medical Society[2] in which he referred to "the proverbial kinds of falsehoods, 'lies, damned lies, and statistics.'" The fact that he referred to the phrase as "proverbial" seems to imply that he thought it familiar at that time.
The phrase has also been attributed to [William] Abraham Hewitt (1875-1966), and Commander Holloway Halstead Frost (1889-1935). Since the phrase was current by 1892, Frost can be eliminated and Hewitt must be very unlikely indeed.
Contents |
[edit] Uses
The phrase has been used in a number of popular expositions, including:
- Quotes, Damned Quotes ..... some of them to do with statistics (1985), by John Bibby - an attempt to disentangle the history of this quotation.
- Damned Lies and Statistics: Untangling Numbers from the Media, Politicians, and Activists, by University of Delaware sociologist Joel Best; 2001
- How to Lie with Statistics by Darrell Huff; 1954.
- The essay The Median Isn't the Message by Stephen Jay Gould begins by repeating this quote. Gould then explains how the statistic that mesothelioma, the form of cancer with which he was diagnosed in 1982, has a "median survival time of eight months," is misleading.
[edit] Popular culture
- An episode of the first season of the TV show The West Wing is titled "Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics."
- Nate Silver writes a weekly column for Baseball Prospectus titled "Lies, Damned Lies."
[edit] References
- ^ Mark Twain. My Autobiography. Project Gutenberg. Retrieved on 2007-03-05.
- ^ a b Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics. University of York. Retrieved on 2007-03-05.
[edit] External link
- Attributions to Courtney and Cornelia Crosse
- Mark Twain, "Chapters from My Autobiography," North American Review 186 (July 5, 1907} [1]
