Simpsons Logical Fallacies: Misuse of Statistics

Open captions change to closed captions during second half of video. Use of copyrighted content is protected by fair use which says that copyrighted content can be used so long as commentary is given. Definitions of logical fallacies come from Practical Argument by Laurie G. Kirszner and Stephen R. Mandell.

[OrenLikes]

Disco records could still go up 400% next year, if someone buys one record this year, and then buys 5 records next year, if records can be found anywhere... :)

[komodosp]

People can come with statistics to prove anything. 40% of all people know that!!

BTW, correctly using the word 'data' as plural? mwah! :)

[williamfincher]

In statistics, the numbers are only useful if you know what they represent.

[puppiecutie]

is this one similar to the card-stacking fallacy?

[cameronspalding]

Here’s another misuse of statistics: when people hear about the wage gap, people say that women get paid 73 cents for every dollar men get paid, this is a misinterpretation of the actual statistic which shows that the average annual earnings for women is 73% as much as the average annual earnings for men.
The problem with this interpretation is that this statistic doesn’t take into account many of the variables that affect how much an employee earns: such as number of hours worked, how much overtime, l was worked, how many days of vacation were taken, how many sick days were taken, and also
As it turns out: men are more likely to work overtime, more likely to go into work despite being sick, take less time for vacations etc, once you take all these factors into account (and more factors that I didn’t write down here), the ‘pay gap’ shrinks to the point of vanishing.
Here’s another one, there’s a statistic from the FBI that claims that 8% of f rape claims are false: many interpret this to mean that 92% of rape claims must be true if 8% are false, this is flawed because the figure from the FBI only includes claims that have been proven to be false: this doesn’t include claims that don’t have enough evidence to prove it either way, knowing this it’s erroneous to assume that 92% of rape claims must be true