Data

Some quotes on data that I quite like:

• The plural of anecdote is not data. (Frank Kotsonis)
• Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts. (Daniel Moynihan)
• Errors using inadequate data are much less than those using no data at all. (Charles Babbage)
• All information is imperfect. We have to treat it with humility. (Jacob Bronowski)
• It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts. (“Sherlock Holmes”)
• Intuition becomes increasingly valuable in the new information society precisely because there is so much data. (John Naisbitt)
• The idea is to try to give all the information to help others to judge the value of your contribution; not just the information that leads to judgment in one particular direction or another. (Richard Feynman)
• I don’t see the logic of rejecting data just because they seem incredible. (Fred Hoyle)
• If you torture data sufficiently, it will confess to almost anything. (Fred Menger)
• Get your facts first, then you can distort them as you please. (Mark Twain)
• Science is organized common sense where many a beautiful theory was killed by an ugly fact. (Thomas H Huxley)

and finally…

• There’s no sense being exact about something if you don’t even know what you’re talking about. (John von Neumann)