Monday, July 25, 2011
Week 8: Chapter 13, Numbers
Chapter 13 discusses about, "Misleading Claims with Numbers." Many claims can be very vague when it comes to using numbers as general statistic. An example that Epstein used in the book was, "Zoe has 4 apples and Dick has 2 oranges. Who has more?" More of what is the misleading interpretation. We can sit there for minutes and ponder, hmm, what is the right answer? When in reality, Epstein is absolutely correct, we always have to be clear and precise on what claiming or trying to prove. "When numbers are used it looks exact, but a vague or meaningless comparison gets no better by having a few numbers in it." What I took from this learning is to be precise with my thoughts by making a strong claim even if I want to add numbers by making my claim more visual. It has to be a valid claim. From time to time, I would hear over the news that San Jose is one of the safest cities to reside in. But now I've realized, it could potentially be a valid claim, but it's also a misleading one. Because it seems to prove a safe point but comparable to what and where or why? There's not much relativity or supporting details.
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I definitely agree with being precise about your claims, regardless of using numbers or not. By using numbers, we can sometimes just make our arguments more confusing sometimes, unless we can use visuals, like graphs and numbers, to make our point explicitly clear. I also think that the apples to oranges method also plays a big part, as you said, in how our arguments come off to other people. We have to be so clear and precise with people when make our claims and arguments in order to let them see what we are trying to prove. I agree with you when you said making a strong argument regardless of using numbers is extremely important.
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