On Tue, Jan 8, 2013 at 4:58 AM, Steven D'Aprano <steve+comp.lang.pyt...@pearwood.info> wrote: > Anyone can fool themselves into placing a line through a subset of non- > linear data. Or, sadly more often, *deliberately* cherry picking fake > clusters in order to fool others. Here is a real world example of what > happens when people pick out the data clusters that they like based on > visual inspection: > > http://www.skepticalscience.com/images/TempEscalator.gif
And sensible people will notice that, even drawn like that, it's only a ~0.6 deg increase across ~30 years. Hardly statistically significant, given that weather patterns have been known to follow cycles at least that long. But that's nothing to do with drawing lines through points, and more to do with how much data you collect before you announce a conclusion, and how easily a graph can prove any point you like. Statistical analysis is a huge science. So is lying. And I'm not sure most people can pick one from the other. ChrisA -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
