The Write Stuff
[vc_single_image image=”62073″]June 2018
Numbers Game
By Alan Crawford,
Impact Editor
We’ve become a “numerate society,” the British historian J. H. Plumb wrote.
We put more faith “in evidence expressed numerically” than in almost any other form, “no matter how shaky the statistical evidence,” even when the margins of error “are so very great that the calculations are almost meaningless.” For a splendid example of punditry that exhibits these unfortunate traits, check out this Dan Balz column from mid-May.
Typical of so much political commentary, the Washington Post columnist cites in the most general way imaginable a slew of “reliable indicators” that include survey data and approval ratings, “a number of the statistics,” “a review of numbers dating back to the 1980s,” a “key dynamic” here, and a “single biggest factor” there.
These figures (or vague and offhand references to them) purport to measure, among other imponderables, the “energy” of some voters, the “intensity of feeling” of others, and “the enthusiasm gap” between two large groups of voters, Republicans and Democrats.
All this summoning of statistics seems to suggest precision, when of course it offers nothing of the kind, ostensibly supporting much larger conclusions that defy definition — and therefore cannot be measured. What, really, is “the national mood”? What does it mean to say that people in the mass “feel more optimistic” about one thing, while “fewer people think” such-and-such about something else? Who are these people, and what is meant by their “energy”? What is “the political environment,” or “the public’s general mood,” and in a nation of 326 million people thinking and feeling as individuals how could any such thing be defined, much less quantified?
Good writing is really just clear thinking. Before you write, figure out what you want to say, which means applying some discipline to your ideas. Define your terms at least to your own satisfaction. Give real thought to how you can support the argument you intend to make. Making casual allusions to unexamined “statistics,” however tempting in today’s “numerate society,” is just a lazy way to hoodwink uncritical readers into thinking you’ve supported your argument with clarity and precision when you haven’t. Once you’ve decided on the point you want to make, the words should take care of themselves, but if you do use research and statistics, be specific and make sure the application is correct.
In addition to being the editor of Impact, Alan Crawford is a published author and journalist. His latest book, How Not to Get Rich, looks at the financial misadventures of Mark Twain.
Annoying Word of the Month: Icon. John McCain is an “icon,” Vanity Fair tells us, but so, according to Forbes, was Tom Wolfe. Of icon and iconic, the late Alexander Cockburn, media critic for The Village Voice, said he used “to trip over this gee-whiz epithet 30 times a day,” and that was in 2012. In mid-May, a far from scientific study, meaning a Google search, finds icon or iconic applied to Modigliani, Tippi Hedren, the Star Wars franchise, a church in Pittsburgh, Freddie Mercury, Jeff Goldblum’s “shirtless scene” in Jurassic Park, quotes from Pauly D of “Jersey Shore,” Margo Kidder’s Lois Lane, the Coney Island boardwalk, the Chicken Pie Shop in Fresno and the Driftwood Gentlemen’s Club outside Fort LeJeune.
Can we conclude from this that the word has been drained of all meaning and should be banned?
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Contact Alan Crawford, editor, Impact
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