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From: josh@topaz.ARPA (J Storrs Hall)
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: Re: Merry Christmas from the NRA
Message-ID: <263@topaz.ARPA>
Date: Mon, 14-Jan-85 23:59:12 EST
Article-I.D.: topaz.263
Posted: Mon Jan 14 23:59:12 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 17-Jan-85 03:44:52 EST
References: <1875@inmet.UUCP>
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.
Lines: 21

> >>> 
> >>> Last year, Handguns killed
> >>> 
    ... I'm sure you're all tired of seeing this by now...
> >....  So you are telling us that
> >Americans are 26165% more murderous than Germans.
> 
> This, all by itself, probably deserves a chapter in "How to Lie with
> Statistics".
> 
> You did not correct for relative population, (just as a start), nor
> do you have any control for Germans and Americans under the same
> laws (so that you can evaluate how they respond to different ones), nor
> do you compare the relative homicide rates for ALL types of killings.

That particular comparison, as the astute reader will have inferred
from something I posted earlier, is straight from HCI's "Guns Don't Die,
People Do."  It can be distinguished from "How to Lie with Statistics"
in that it consists only of the examples.

--JoSH