Tuesday, March 15, 2011

Proof vs Truth

The famous saying is that you can prove anything with statistics...a lesser known and probably less, um, catchy saying is this:

Given anything, you can prove anything.

But the truth is that given enough hand-wavy argumentation, impressive numbers, big words and confidence, most people will believe anything. Speaking as a person with a strong tendency towards gullibility, I can tell you that this can be a real problem...

You see, the fact that I am convinced of something does not make it true. And not all true things are necessarily all that convincing...

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