THE WORLD IS AWASH WITH bullshit, and we’re drowning in it.
Politicians are unconstrained by facts. Science is conducted by press release. Silicon Valley startups elevate bullshit to high art. Colleges and universities reward bullshit over analytic thought. The majority of administrative activity seems to be little more than a sophisticated exercise in the combinatorial reassembly of bullshit. Advertisers wink conspiratorially and invite us to join them in seeing through all the bullshit. We wink back—but in doing so drop our guard and fall for the second-order bullshit they are shoveling at us. Bullshit pollutes our world by misleading people about specific issues, and it undermines our ability to trust information in general. However modest, this book is our attempt to fight back.
Calling Bullshit
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An edition of Calling Bullshit
(2020)
Calling Bullshit
The Art of Scepticism in a Data-Driven World
by Carl T. Bergstrom, Jevin D. West
- 1 Ratings
- 7 Want to read
- 0 Currently reading
- 1 Have read
Bullshit isn’t what it used to be. Now, two science professors give us the tools to dismantle misinformation and think clearly in a world of fake news and bad data.
Misinformation, disinformation, and fake news abound and it’s increasingly difficult to know what’s true. Our media environment has become hyperpartisan. Science is conducted by press release. Startup culture elevates bullshit to high art. We are fairly well equipped to spot the sort of old-school bullshit that is based in fancy rhetoric and weasel words, but most of us don’t feel qualified to challenge the avalanche of new-school bullshit presented in the language of math, science, or statistics. In Calling Bullshit, Professors Carl Bergstrom and Jevin West give us a set of powerful tools to cut through the most intimidating data.
You don’t need a lot of technical expertise to call out problems with data. Are the numbers or results too good or too dramatic to be true? Is the claim comparing like with like? Is it confirming your personal bias? Drawing on a deep well of expertise in statistics and computational biology, Bergstrom and West exuberantly unpack examples of selection bias and muddled data visualization, distinguish between correlation and causation, and examine the susceptibility of science to modern bullshit.
We have always needed people who call bullshit when necessary, whether within a circle of friends, a community of scholars, or the citizenry of a nation. Now that bullshit has evolved, we need to relearn the art of skepticism.
Subjects
Philosophy
| Edition | Availability |
|---|---|
1
Calling Bullshit: The Art of Scepticism in a Data-Driven World
2020, Penguin Books, Limited
in English
0241327237 9780241327234
|
aaaa
Libraries near you:
WorldCat
|
2
Calling Bullshit: The Art of Skepticism in a Data-Driven World
Aug 04, 2020, Random House
hardcover
0525509186 9780525509189
|
zzzz
Libraries near you:
WorldCat
|
Calling Bullshit
First published in 2020
Subjects
PhilosophyWork Description
Bullshit isn’t what it used to be. Now, two science professors give us the tools to dismantle misinformation and think clearly in a world of fake news and bad data.
Misinformation, disinformation, and fake news abound and it’s increasingly difficult to know what’s true. Our media environment has become hyperpartisan. Science is conducted by press release. Startup culture elevates bullshit to high art. We are fairly well equipped to spot the sort of old-school bullshit that is based in fancy rhetoric and weasel words, but most of us don’t feel qualified to challenge the avalanche of new-school bullshit presented in the language of math, science, or statistics. In Calling Bullshit, Professors Carl Bergstrom and Jevin West give us a set of powerful tools to cut through the most intimidating data.
You don’t need a lot of technical expertise to call out problems with data. Are the numbers or results too good or too dramatic to be true? Is the claim comparing like with like? Is it confirming your personal bias? Drawing on a deep well of expertise in statistics and computational biology, Bergstrom and West exuberantly unpack examples of selection bias and muddled data visualization, distinguish between correlation and causation, and examine the susceptibility of science to modern bullshit.
We have always needed people who call bullshit when necessary, whether within a circle of friends, a community of scholars, or the citizenry of a nation. Now that bullshit has evolved, we need to relearn the art of skepticism.
Excerpts
Page xi,
added by faraixyz.)
"Outlines just how much bs is in the world."
Links outside Open Library
Calling Bullshit
The Art of Scepticism in a Data-Driven World
This edition was published in 2020 by Penguin Books, Limited
Table of Contents
| Preface | xi | |
| Chapter 1 | Bullshit Everywhere | 3 |
| Chapter 2 | Medium, Message, and Misinformation | 18 |
| Chapter 3 | The Nature of Bullshit | 38 |
| Chapter 4 | Causality | 50 |
| Chapter 5 | Numbers and Nonsense | 77 |
| Chapter 6 | Selection Bias | 104 |
| Chapter 7 | Data Visualization | 134 |
| Chapter 8 | Calling Bullshit on Big Data | 180 |
| Chapter 9 | The Susceptibility of Science | 206 |
| Chapter 10 | Spotting Bullshit | 242 |
| Chapter 11 | Refuting Bullshit | 264 |
| Acknowledgments | 287 | |
| Bibliography | 289 | |
| Index | 309 |
ID Numbers
| December 14, 2020 | Edited by faraixyz | Added description, excerpt and links to website. |
| September 1, 2020 | Edited by ImportBot | import existing book |
| August 4, 2020 | Created by ImportBot | import new book |