The Subtle Art of Lying with Statistics
338 | Thu 31 Jul 4:30 p.m.–5:15 p.m.
Presented by
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Currently providing open source technical evangelism for NGINX, Dave works with DevOps, developers and architects to understand the advantages of modern architectures and orchestration to solve large-scale distributed systems challenges, using open source and its innovation. Dave has been a champion for open systems and open source from the early days of Linux to today's world of OpenTelemetry and observability.
Dave was named as one of the top ten pioneers in open source by Computer Business Review, having cut his teeth on Linux and compilers before the phrase "open source" was coined. Well-versed in trivia, he won a Golden Penguin in 2002. When he's not talking, you can find him hiking with his trusty camera, trying to keep up with his wife.
Currently providing open source technical evangelism for NGINX, Dave works with DevOps, developers and architects to understand the advantages of modern architectures and orchestration to solve large-scale distributed systems challenges, using open source and its innovation. Dave has been a champion for open systems and open source from the early days of Linux to today's world of OpenTelemetry and observability.
Dave was named as one of the top ten pioneers in open source by Computer Business Review, having cut his teeth on Linux and compilers before the phrase "open source" was coined. Well-versed in trivia, he won a Golden Penguin in 2002. When he's not talking, you can find him hiking with his trusty camera, trying to keep up with his wife.
Abstract
"Lies, damned lies and statistics." While true, only statistics allow you to lie to yourself.
Let's explore how statistics can sometimes trick us into believing something untrue. This isn't always done intentionally; we mislead ourselves without realizing it. We'll look at how focusing solely on recent events, choosing specific data to look at, and making assumptions about the size of a group can lead us to the wrong conclusions. We'll show examples of how graphs and numbers can be used in misleading ways. The presentation aims to teach you to look at statistics more critically, understand their limits, and avoid fooling yourself with numbers.
"Lies, damned lies and statistics." While true, only statistics allow you to lie to yourself. Let's explore how statistics can sometimes trick us into believing something untrue. This isn't always done intentionally; we mislead ourselves without realizing it. We'll look at how focusing solely on recent events, choosing specific data to look at, and making assumptions about the size of a group can lead us to the wrong conclusions. We'll show examples of how graphs and numbers can be used in misleading ways. The presentation aims to teach you to look at statistics more critically, understand their limits, and avoid fooling yourself with numbers.