Calculated Risks
by Gerd Gigerenzer · first published 2002
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Gigerenzer explains that a major obstacle to our understanding of numbers is that we live with an illusion of certainty. Many of us believe that HIV tests, DNA fingerprinting, and the growing number of genetic tests are absolutely certain. But even DNA evidence can produce spurious matches. We cling to our illusion of certainty because the medical industry, insurance companies, investment advisers, and election campaigns have become purveyors of certainty, marketing it like a commodity. To avoid confusion, says Gigerenzer, we should rely on more understandable representations of risk, such as
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I like Gerd Gigerenzer's book Calculated Risks: How to Know When Numbers Deceive You http://www.amazon.com/Calculated-Risks-Know-Numbers-Deceive/... for readable training in rational thinking. Interestingly, Gigerenzer's more recent books have focused…
on “What Is Intelligence, Anyway?” ↗The author is a mathematician, and thus used to thinking about percentages and numbers. Gerd Gigerenzer has a nice book, Reckoning with Risk (or Calculated Risks: How to Know When Numbers Deceive You in the US), in which he calls for people to stop using percentages and to use natural numbers numbers instead. When you say that someone's risk has increased by…
on “Mathematics meets real life” ↗