And what a treasure it is turning out to be.
Most of us take numbers as fact. We accept anything with numbers attached as automatic proof (hence the title).
And politicians, Pastors, academics, “experts”, brands (especially brands) are taking advantage of this to make bogus claims and spread falsehood. And they seem to be getting away with it.
On October 16, 1995, Louis Farrakhan, leader of Nation of Islam, held an enormous rally: the “Million Man Match.” Of course the gathering was “branded” as such long before the event. Long before anyone knew whether a million men (not counting women) would actually show up.
True, the crowd at the National Mall in Washington that day was huge. But did it really live up to its “Million Man” name?
Mr. Farrankhan was adamant that it did. But the Park Service, the agency responsible for providing official crowd figures claimed it was 400,000 people, give or take 20%. Furious, Mr. Farrakhan threatened to sue. Park Service backed down.
Because anyone countering a claim of one million (for whatever purpose it serves), must show proof. No one actually counted the people. So none had any proof. Not Farrakhan. Not Park Service.
Since then, the Park Service stopped estimating crowd sizes. If anyone is gullible enough to fall for cheap publicity, well, it’s their piece of cake.
It is when you see Old Trafford at full capacity (75,000 plus) that you appreciate the sheer magnitude of a One Million crowd size. One million will overwhelm any location and its facilities.
Yet, we keep hearing this claim, even here in Nigeria. Anyway, no need to go there.
There is an aging guide at a natural history museum who conducts visitors around the exhibits. The tour ends with the most spectacular sight in the museum. It is the skeleton of a fearsome dinosaur – a tyrannosaurus.
One day, a teenager gestures at the old guide and asks, “How old is it?”
“Sixty-five million and thirty-eight years old,” the guide responds proudly.
“How could you possibly know that?” the teenager shoots back.
“Simple! On the very day that I started working here at the museum, I asked a scientist the very same question. He told me that the skeleton was 65 million years old. That was 38 years ago.”
Seeking to achieve exactitude by attaching 38 years to the 65 million-year scientific estimate to claim that the skeleton is 65,000,0038 years old was completely absurd. And WRONG!
This is because the original 65m year-age was a rough estimate. Fossil dates can be off by a few hundred thousand or even a few million years.
And how many are we really in the world? 7 billion, if you believe today’s numbers.
On October 13, 1999, with TV flashbulbs popping around him, UN Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, held a young Bosnian boy, welcoming him to the world as the six billionth person on earth.
Really?
The 6th billionth baby happened to have just been delivered as Kofi Annan was visiting Sarajevo. P-L-E-A-S-E! When every minute, 51 babies are born in India, 11 of them in the most populous state, Uttar Pradesh, according to BBC. The book is full of so many of such deception by numbers, from currencies, to graphs, measurements, advertisements, etc.
A final one I will like to share with you is the use of averages. To most people, “average” means “typical”. Well, not quite. It depends.
If you say the average salary at a company is $100,000, then each employee earns $100,000, more or less. Infact, that may not be the case. Let’s illustrate.
Salaries of ten people added together and divided by 10, gives the average salary.
Company A salaries: $100,000 + $101,000 + $98,500 + $99,700 + $103,200 + $100,300 + $99,000 + $96,800 + $100,000 + $ 101,500 = $1,000,000
$1,000,000 divided by 10, gives $100,000.
Company B salaries: $999,991 (CEO salary), plus nine Interns each with $1 salary. $999,9991 + $9 = $1,000,000.
$1,000,000 divided by 10, gives $100,000.
But is the “average” salary in Company B truly $100,000?
If a new hire is going to join both companies strictly based on “average” salary, in which of the companies, would he realistically expect to earn $100,000?
There are just so many instances of such numbers-game going on in the world, that the book documents.
This book has taught me two lessons:
1. Never judge a book by its cover, as is often advised, to which I would add, by its title
2. It is amazing what one can often stumble upon when you allow your reading to roam a bit.
Warm regards.
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Martin Udogie is the founder of BOTTOMLINE Newsletter:
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