What is the chance of that!? It is a question that almost all people ask--sometimes after the fact--in trying to make sense of a seemingly improbably event and, at other times, in preparation for action, as an attempt to foresee and plan for all the possibilities that lie ahead. In either case, it is mathematics in general, and probability and statistics in particular, that the public looks to for a final answer to this question. One out of one hundred, 4 to 1 odds, an expected lifetime of 75 years--these are the sorts of answers people want. When used honestly and correctly, numbers can help clarify the essence of a confusing situation by decoupling it from prejudicial assumptions or emotional conclusions. When used incorrectly--or even worse, deceitfully--they can lend a false sense of scientific objectivity to an assertion, misleading those who are not careful enough or knowledgeable enough to look into the reasoning underlying the numerical conclusions.<br><br>It is important to be able to distinguish between these two scenarios. ...
The CAUSE Research Group is supported in part by a member initiative grant from the American Statistical Association’s Section on Statistics and Data Science Education