Excursion # 5: Deception!

Math is Crisp.

Math is Clear.             (eventually)

Math is Honorable.

....but sometimes it is used to deceive.  It is a sad thing to admit, but sometimes this wonderful, elegant, honest subject is used to deceive folks into believing things they shouldn't believe, or buying things they shouldn't buy.

And you may not have noticed this, but not everyone loves math.  And lots of people think they aren't very good at it.

Some are downright afraid of it.

And there are folks who take advantage of that.

They use people's lack of comfort with math to make bald and untrue statements about the statistics of things, or the value of things.

They know that most people won't check it out, or stop to think if it makes sense.

But you can outsmart those who would outsmart you.

It's easy.

All you have to do, is think.

Clean

In this excursion, hunt for attempts of folks to deceive other folks using numbers and statistics.

Look at advertisements, and question the validity of the numbers they give.

Do the percentages make sense, or do they deceive?

Are the values as good as they seem to suggest? 

Can you find actual errors?

How about statistics reported in news stories.  Do they make sense, or do they deceive?

Okay then, head off on this excursion..... making the world free of deception, and a more noble use of numbers.

Clear

Crisp