Thinking Clearly with Data

Abstract

The world has changed in transformative ways. Data and evidence are ubiquitous. Quantitative information suffuses our talk of everything from policy to health care to job searches to politics to sports to education to dating to national security. As a result, statistics and quantitative reasoning must no longer be the purview of only those who have a knack for mathematics or are headed for technical careers. Acquiring competence in foundational quantitative reasoning is now a fundamental responsibility of every educated human being and citizen. And this necessitates new ways of teaching and learning. It was with that goal in mind that we decided to write Thinking Clearly with Data. But we didn’t start with the book. Much of the material and ideas that ultimately found their way into the coming chapters were first developed for courses aimed at providing to students with little technical background the tools needed to be serious, thoughtful, and skeptical consumers of quantitative information. These courses include traditional university offerings, like introductions to quantitative reasoning taught to both undergraduate and graduate students at the University of Chicago. But they also include executive education courses offered to policy makers, military officers, national security experts, intelligence professionals, and journalists. We learned a lot of lessons along the way that inform the choices we made in writing and organizing this book. Perhaps the most important was