How to Lie with Statistics

'Round numbers,' pronounced Dr Johnson, 'are always false.'

But not, of course, the precise and scientific calculations of trained statisticians with their decimals and percentages. The computer, like the camera, cannot lie. Not without help anyhow.

Describing his book as 'a sort of primer in ways to use statistics to deceive', Darrell Huff goes on to introduce the beginner to the niceties of samples (random or stratified random), averages (mean, median or modal), errors (probable, standard or unintentional), graphs, indexes and other tools of democratic persuasion.

When it was first published this now classic book was hailed as 'a splendid piece of blasphemy against the preposterous religion of our time'. Today statistics continue to baffle us, and this trenchant book remains an invaluable guide through the maze of facts and figures that is designed to make us believe anything.

Author: Darrell Huff