A comment posted by a reader on a recent post reprimanded me for suggesting that marijuana caused relationships to go bad. In this instance the reader was mistaken, as I had specifically used the word ...

Jonathan Borwein (Jon) receives funding from the ARC. Michael Rose does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, ...

Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. I write about the broad intersection of data and society. As machine learning has expanded beyond its roots in the worlds of ...

Paul Kaplan: Quoting Benjamin Disraeli, Mark Twain famously quipped, "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics." In the field of investments, in which we rely heavily on ...

Shark attacks and ice cream sales follow the very same trajectory when charted. When ice cream sales go up, so do shark attacks. When ice cream sales decrease, shark attacks decrease. With a ...

There’s an old saying that goes, “figures don’t lie, but liars can figure.” But sometimes even the figures can spin a confusing story. That’s why I’ve always appreciated the power of understanding ...

Correlation doesn't imply causation. You've probably heard that before. It's a true statement that's important in statistical analysis—if more tall people own cats, that doesn't mean that cats cause ...

For some people, coffee is like air – necessary for survival. As the saying goes, however, there can be too much of a good thing. Yes, we need air, but too much kills cells, so medical professionals ...