TOP 100 SCIENCE SITES
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| Panel: India must secure elephant reserves By NIRMALA GEORGE 2010-09-01T01:22:33ZNEW DELHI (AP) -- India should protect its elephant population by securing its wildlife reserves, curbing poaching and restricting development in the corridors they use to travel between forested areas, a panel recommended.... hosted.ap.org |
BP Begins Last Step in Sealing Stricken Well in the Gulf No oil or gas was found at the interception point of a relief well and the stricken well, clearing the way for final cement sealing. feeds.nytimes.com |
The simple truth about statistics In the age of the internet, there is no reason why anyone should be fooled by statisticsMatt Parker's website is Stand-up MathematicianIt is the British prime minister Benjamin Disraeli who is famously credited with the phrase: "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics" but the expression has been around almost as long as the word statistics (first coined in 1749 for those wondering). What is it about numerical data that sparks such distrust in people?Partly, there seems to be an assumption that anything involving numbers is an dark art that needs to be left to experts. Few non-mathematicians – including politicians and journalists – seem to have the numerical confidence to question or check statistics they are given. This led the (then opposition) Conservative party to report in February this year that in deprived areas 54% of women under 18 will fall pregnant (it should have been 5.4%). Then the Independent continued the theme last week (22 September) by deciding that 49% of all girls under 18 have had abortions. If you make the quick assumption that half of all under 18s are under 9s, then this implies all girls from 9 to 18 must have had an abortion. In both of these cases, if people had taken the time to think about the statistics, any logical person could tell that something was amiss.Even when statistics are carefully checked, and don't have the decimal point equivalent of a typo, things don't always look right. During the same August week two different media stories broke: one painting a grim picture of breast cancer rates in the UK; the other a much more optimistic picture.Monday 9 August: "Breast cancer rates in the UK are more than four times higher than those in eastern Africa, the World Cancer Research Fund has revealed." This is the original press release.Thursday 13 August: "Death rates from breast cancer have fallen more dramatically in the UK than any other European country, cancer researchers have said." Original report.Both reports were using completely accurate statistics, but simply used different measures to back up their message.The statistics comparing England and Wales with Europe were published in the British Medical Journal (BMJ). These results measured breast cancer mortality, which is how many women will die from breast cancer in a year for every 100,000 women in the population. Between 1989 and 2006 England and Wales did indeed record the highest drop in breast cancer deaths in Europe. What wasn't reported was that England started with the worst death rate out of all 30 European countries (of 100,000 English women, 42 would die from breast cancer in 1989 compared with a European average of 30). Despite the biggest decrease in Europe, England still has the seventh worst death rate in Europe (28 women out of 100,000, compared with Romania 23, Poland 21 and Spain 19).As for the World Cancer Research Fund (WCRF) report that compared the UK with East Africa: it was looking at how many women in 100,000 were diagnosed with breast cancer, not deaths. There are several problems trying to compare UK statistics with East Africa's. The report does mention in passing that the eastern Africa numbers are only reported cases. Much of the population do not have sufficient access to medical support to be diagnosed in the first place.Not only that, but a quick check on the World Health Organisation's website shows that the average life expectancy for women in Zimbabwe is only 42.3 years (compared with the UK's 81.7 years). Most women in East Africa simply do not live long enough to get breast cancer. In the UK, eight out of 10 breast cancers are diagnosed in women aged 50 and over. That women in a different country have half the life expectancy of the UK is the real story, not that our decadent western lifestyle is causing breast cancer.Untangling the BMJ statistics involved just looking at the table of figures attached to the published paper, and the WCRF report was quickly put into context with a glance at WHO figures. This doesn't require any form of mathematical training; thanks to the internet, anyone with a curious mind can check around statistics to see what the real story is. This shouldn't happen only when there are two seemingly contradictory stories breaking in the same week: any message that is based on statistics should expect to be subjected to lay scrutiny.By their very nature, statistics can only be misused when the audience doesn't bother checking them. Statistics are just a numerical summary of evidence that has been collected. They give people the starting point to delve directly into that evidence and see if the arguments hold together.When misused, statistics are less Disraeli's "damned lies" and more another leader's "I did not have sexual relations with that woman". It is by not presenting all of the information and selectively choosing definitions that statistics can appear to lie. But such claims will not stand up under cross-examination.Matt Parker's website is Stand-up MathematicianMathematicsguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds guardian.co.uk |
Treasure trove: The lost glory of Rome | Editorial The unhappy story of a Roman helmet found in Cumbria has exposed the weaknesses of the Treasure ActWho owns our past? For almost 1,000 years, the answer was simple. From the 12th century until 1997, anyone finding ancient gold or silver objects in the ground was obliged, under the common law of treasure trove, to report it. Ownership was determined by an archaic process. The system was flawed: it led to a guessing game about the intentions of someone hundreds of years into the past. It also failed to protect properly that great majority of artefacts not made from gold or silver.Unfortunately, the statute law that replaced it, the 1996 Treasure Act, is no better. Its weaknesses have been exposed by the unhappy story of a Roman helmet found this year in Cumbria. The helmet is astonishing: a product of the greatest skill, a human face in bronze and tin of a quality far beyond most classical relics. It was made somewhere in the eastern Roman empire in the first or second century and brought to Britain around the time of the emperor Hadrian. Of a design described in the writings of Arrian of Nicomedia, it was probably worn in jousting contests. It is one of only three ever found in this country, and much the finest. It should be in a museum. Instead was sold last week at auction for £2.3m to an unknown buyer and may never be shown in public.The story began in May, when the helmet was found by someone searching a field with a metal detector, near the Cumbrian village of Crosby Garrett. Because the helmet is not made of precious metal, and was not part of a bigger hoard, it did not fall under the scope of the Treasure Act, which would have required it to be handed to the crown in return for a reward – the process used recently to save the Staffordshire hoard from sale. Instead, it was rapidly restored and put up for sale by the auctioneers Christie's, almost before locals in Cumbria had heard of its discovery. There began a campaign to buy it for the Tullie House museum in Carlisle, near the western end of Hadrian's Wall – but last week it was forced to drop out of the bidding when the price passed £2m, far above the estimate.No one is sure what will happen now. If the helmet was sold to a foreign buyer, an export ban could be imposed, giving the museum time to match the price. If – as rumoured – it has been sold to someone in Britain, the law cannot help. It is right that the finders of historical objects should get a reward, if only because without it artefacts would end up on the black market. But the Treasure Act is too restricted: it should be expanded to cover significant single objects not made of gold or silver. Millions were raised in 2004 to prevent the loss of Raphael's Madonna of the Pinks. The Crosby Garrett helmet – of equal beauty – should not be lost to Cumbria, where it has rested for almost 2,000 years.Archaeologyguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds guardian.co.uk |
Extinction threat for more species One fifth of animal and plant species are threatened by extinction, a global study warns, but conservation efforts have pulled some back from the brink. bbc.co.uk |