Content tagged with “statistics” under “The Interesting List”

“ A study examined the paths created by consistently following the first link in a Wikipedia article. Ninety-five percent (95%) of them eventually led to the page on Philosophy. ”

“ Higher education does lead to more liberal political viewpoints, but the gap isn’t as large as many claim it to be. ”

“ Statistics from analyzing the content of 2,000 Oscar acceptance speeches. ”

“ Employers who took the effort to find and install an alternative web browser performed better on every metric and stayed in jobs longer. ”

“ A researcher found that many records of people living over 100 years were concentrated in places that had no birth records and high rates of pension fraud. ”

“ It’s a lot harder than you think to calculate how many marriages end in divorce. ”

“ This news report from 2009 is an experiment that proves short men have significant challenges romantically compared to taller men. ”

“ Many charts seem to show that something dramatic happened to the U.S. economy in 1971. No answers are provided. ”

“ Humans are not generating enough replacements to maintain the world’s current population. ”

“ This site lists the days since something bad happened, from an earthquake of any kind (zero, because one happens every day) to things like a ‘Teraton Asteroid Impact’ (last happened 35 million years ago), and everything in between (example: someone last lost a nuclear weapon in 1989). ”

“ The act of preparing for or mitigating a disaster or pandemic sometimes reduces the effects to the point where we’re convinced the threat never existed or that we overreacted. ”

“ The title gets fact-checked, but is mostly true: the vast majority of the population of the world will experience sunlight at the same time during a 1-minute period every July 8. ”

“ A car company claimed to have driven their car at 331 mph. But some viewers proved they didn’t, using nothing a stopwatch and Google Maps. ”

“ The men’s javelin throw record is fully 25-years-old, and might be the hardest record to beat. ”

“ Most Canadians live south of the northern border of the United States. The Canadian population is wildly undistributed. ”

“ A record temperature that stood for 90 years was probably just human error. ”

“ Researchers have tracked almost a quarter-million cases of COVID back to a single conference in February 2020 which was attended by 200 people. ”

“ Hardly anyone lives in a big chunk of the United States, and that pattern is true for most countries. Where cities historically started and thrived comes down to geography and water. ”

“ Using anonymized cell phone tower data, watch how software can track all the Sturgis attendees as they move across the country. ”

“ Attractive people generally have easier lives. We all know this intuitively, but we rarely acknowledge it. ”

“ A survey that seems to prove that consuming news primarily via social media causes you to be less engaged and more likely to fall for conspiracy theories. ”

“ Nigerian immigrants to the United States might be the most successful ethnic group in the country. ”

“ An ordered listing of countries by actual landmass, not simply perceived size, which is affected by mapping distortions. ”

“ In 2016, a guy playing around with data discovered too many similarities between crossword puzzles, all centered around a specific editor. ”

“ There are five rules that govern our thinking about the risk of certain situations or activities. They cause us to dramatically over- and under- estimate risk. ”

“ There are a stunning number of records kept about the Academy Awards. ”

“ Completing a contemporary baseball game in less than two hours is a very rare thing. One particular pitcher seemed to always be trying. ”

“ It turns out that counting up a death toll for anything is more complicated than you think. Many deaths are very indirect. ”

“ The success of a product can be weirdly predicted by its affinity to a particular group of people who are drawn to failure. If they like it, it’s probably not going to survive. ”

“ A graphical look at how the stock markets reacted during the expansion and contraction phases of various pandemics. ”

“ Skyscrapers have a concept called ‘vanity height’ by which they increase their claimed heights drastically. ”

“ A factual explanation of why helicopters crash more often than planes. ”

“ Some athletes who accomplished virtually nothing, from a guy who played in the NBA for 3.9 seconds, to an NFL running back who ended his career with minus-eight yards on one carry. (And there’s one surprise pick.) ”

“ When you just consider income taxes, wealthy people pay a higher percentage in taxes. But when you consider all the other taxes – payroll, property, and consumption – the curve starts to straighten out. ”

“ Jean Calumet was supposedly 122 when she died. However, a Russian scientist has long-claimed that ‘Jean’ is actually Jean’s daughter, impersonating her mother. ”

“ Numerous studies seem to prove that the wealthier someone is compared to the people around them, the more antisocial behaviors they display. ”

“ Most of the value created by the Internet doesn’t involve people spending money, so it’s hidden from GDP measures. ”

“ The story of a management theory that came and went, then sort of came back. Everything has a hype cycle, and Six Sigma was no exception ”

“ A big predictor of whether someone will live to age 110 seems to be their birth into a region lacking accurate, preserved birth certificates that could prove their age wrong. ”

“ Keni Harisson set the U.S. record in the 110m hurdles, then shockingly failed to qualify for the Olympics. Yet, in between that heartbreak and the actual Olympic games, while competing against all those who did qualify, she breaks the world record. ”

“ Contrary to popular belief, small business is not a driver of job growth. Small businesses just grow faster than big business, so they just appear to increase job growth. ”

“ Fascinating TV movie about the Brexit campaign from the perspective of those who wanted to leave. Emphasizes the usages of data, and the deep divisions in British society that the campaign exploited. ”