Quote:
Originally Posted by twoNeurons
It's not that I don't trust statistics, it's just that statistics can't be trusted. =)
Seriously, although I too would find it interesting to find out the stats, I suspect getting "similar" metrics would be extremely difficult. Adding culture in to the mix (which is an important consideration ) adds more complexity as well.
I find statistics are used often as a weapon to incapacitate common sense.
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And thus why you contradicted yourself. It isn't statistics that can't be trusted, it is those using statistics that can't. Numbers rarely lie. It's people that lie.
For example:
Canada, 9.2 road deaths per 100,000 people per year
Germany, 4.5 road deaths per 100,000 people per year
United Kingdom, 3.59 road deaths per 100,000 people per year
Sweden, 2.9 road deaths per 100,000 people per year
Now look at countries we "know" are probably high and the stats tell us:
Egypt, 42.0 road deaths per 100,000 people per year
Mexico, 20.7 road deaths per 100,000 people per year
India, 11.1 road deaths per 100,000 people per year
Surprisingly, India is not far off Canada, but people would have an assumption that it should be crazy. Remember the stats don't lie, but someone interpreting them may say "See people in Canada drive terribly!! Look how close we compare to India!" not taking into fact the stats are strict stats and don't take into account 2 major facts:
1) population difference
2) how many people actually have cars
So that is an illustration of how stats don't lie but someone could use the above to prove "we drive really bad in Canada" when if you use a different stat:
Road Fatalities per 100,000 MOTOR VEHICLES you get
India, 315 deaths per 100,000 vehicles
Canada, 13 deaths per 100,000 vehicles
Germany, 7.2 deaths per 100,000 vehicles
UK, 7.0 deaths per 100,000 vehicles
Sweden, 7.0 deaths per 100,000 vehicles
Canada is not the best but it is by far not the worst...
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