The BBC reported last week that evidence for the Higgs Boson is “around the two-sigma level of certainty” and provides further explanation:
Particle physics has an accepted definition for a "discovery": a five-sigma level of certainty. The number of standard deviations, or sigmas, is a measure of how unlikely it is that an experimental result is simply down to chance rather than a real effect”
This is nice and clear, but it is also wrong, as we have pointed out before in a previous blog by Kevin McConway.
Lots of press reports in the last couple of days on how UK women are the fattest in Europe, for example in the Daily Mail and on the BBC News website. I'm still in Berlin, and it was in the papers here too. The tabloid-style Berliner Kurier went with the headline "Man, they are fat, man", while the N24 news service went with "British and Maltese are the fattest Europeans". But is it another dodgy league table?
Acute risks, such as riding a motorbike or going skydiving, may result in an accident - a natural unit for comparing such risks is the Micromort, which is a 1-in-a-million chance of sudden death, for some defined activity.
Kings Cross Station now not only has a platform 9$\frac{3}{4}$, but also a platform 0. And for the numerically challenged, there are repeated announcements that 'customers are advised that Platform 0 is situated next to Platform 1'
I suppose the Underground platforms will now have to be given complex numbers.
David Cameron has prominently commented on the recent performance tables concerning adoption in local authorities, in particular the proportion of children whose adoption placement occurs within 12 months. But are the local authorities really as different as they have been made out to be?
Multiple Choice: If you choose an answer to this question at random, what is the chance you will be correct? A) 25% B) 50% C) 60% D) 25%
This is a fun question whose paradoxical, self-referential nature quickly reveals itself – A) seems to be fine until one realizes the D) option is also 25%.
I've taken the headline from this BBC story. The three-fold variation is between Rossendale, in Lancashire, where there were 9 deaths per 100,000 people, and Glasgow City, where there were 31 deaths per 100,000. It's based on this press release from the charity Beating Bowel Cancer,
The BBC News website and Radio 4 news both led this morning on the Royal College of Surgeons' report on emergency surgery. The BBC web site states that
'A report by the college highlights figures that show that about 170,000 patients undergo emergency abdominal operations each year. Of these, 100,000 will develop complications and 25,000 of these patients will die.'
I've taken the headline from 
