英国卫报:你还在相信统计数据吗?(1)（在线收听）

How statistics lost their power – and why we should fear what comes next

统计数据是如何失去其力量的？为什么我们要担心接下来会发生什么

The ability of statistics to accurately represent the world is declining. In its wake, a new age of big data controlled by private companies is taking over – and putting democracy in peril

统计准确反映世界的能力正在下降。随之而来的是，一个由私企控制的大数据新时代正在到来，这让民主处于危险之中

by William Davies

作者：威廉姆·戴维斯

In theory, statistics should help settle arguments. They ought to provide stable reference points that everyone – no matter what their politics – can agree on. Yet in recent years, divergent levels of trust in statistics has become one of the key schisms that have opened up in western liberal democracies. Shortly before the November presidential election, a study in the US discovered that 68% of Trump supporters distrusted the economic data published by the federal government. In the UK, a research project by Cambridge University and YouGov looking at conspiracy theories discovered that 55% of the population believes that the government "is hiding the truth about the number of immigrants living here".

理论上，统计数据应该有助于解决争论。它们应该提供稳定的参考点，让所有人——无论他们的政治立场是什么——都能达成一致。然而，近年来，对统计数据的不同信任程度已成为西方自由民主国家出现的一个关键分裂。在11月总统大选前不久，美国的一项研究发现，68%的特朗普支持者不信任联邦政府公布的经济数据。在英国，剑桥大学和舆观调查网调查阴谋论的一项研究项目发现，55%的人认为政府“隐瞒了居住在这里的移民数量的真相”。

Rather than diffusing controversy and polarisation, it seems as if statistics are actually stoking them. Antipathy to statistics has become one of the hallmarks of the populist right, with statisticians and economists chief among the various "experts" that were ostensibly rejected by voters in 2016. Not only are statistics viewed by many as untrustworthy, there appears to be something almost insulting or arrogant about them. Reducing social and economic issues to numerical aggregates and averages seems to violate some people's sense of political decency.

统计数据似乎并没有分散争议和两极分化，反而加剧了它们。厌恶统计已成为民粹主义右翼的标志之一，在2016年被选民表面拒绝的各类“专家”当中，统计学家和经济学家位居首位。许多人不仅认为统计数据不值得信任，而且认为这些数据似乎有些无礼或傲慢。将社会和经济问题简化为数字的总和和平均数似乎违反了一些人的政治正义感。