An exhilarating tour of the data that drives our world and how to make it work for all of us.
Our world is awash in data. Streaming services track our viewing and listening habits to recommend movies and playlists. Government agencies analyze our credit card transactions to estimate the size of the economy. And artificial intelligence trains on massive quantities of text to answer the questions we ask it. If we want to understand how this deluge of information shapes our lives and even harness it ourselves to make smarter decisions, then we need statistics.
In What Are the Odds? Mark Prell shows that statistics consists of two interwoven strands: data and analysis. Just as important as asking what the data say is asking how reliable the data are. Through stories of centuries of statistical ingenuity, Prell teaches us how to apply the core concepts and methods of statistical thinking to determine the effectiveness of vaccines, build infrastructure to protect against natural disasters, and even plan for retirement. We learn how to avoid spurious reasoning and, just as important, how to recognize and improve data that have been cherry-picked, falsified, or are just plain wrong. As Prell argues, becoming a statistician, even an amateur one, is about more than manipulating data-it's about joining a community of statisticians committed to truth and integrity.
Sprache
Verlagsort
Zielgruppe
Produkt-Hinweis
Fadenheftung
Gewebe-Einband
Illustrationen
1 photo, 85 illus., 14 tables
Maße
Höhe: 235 mm
Breite: 156 mm
ISBN-13
978-0-674-29636-7 (9780674296367)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Klassifikation
Mark Prell is a Senior Economist at the US Department of Agriculture and the author or coauthor of academic articles, book chapters, and government studies in economics, statistical methodology, and data quality. He has also served as Co-Chair of the Federal Committee on Statistical Methodology, which advises US statistical agencies, and has taught economics and statistics at Johns Hopkins University.
