英国卫报:你还在相信统计数据吗?(3)（在线收听）

The declining authority of statistics – and the experts who analyse them – is at the heart of the crisis that has become known as "post-truth" politics. And in this uncertain new world, attitudes towards quantitative expertise have become increasingly divided. From one perspective, grounding politics in statistics is elitist, undemocratic and oblivious to people's emotional investments in their community and nation. It is just one more way that privileged people in London, Washington DC or Brussels seek to impose their worldview on everybody else. From the opposite perspective, statistics are quite the opposite of elitist. They enable journalists, citizens and politicians to discuss society as a whole, not on the basis of anecdote, sentiment or prejudice, but in ways that can be validated. The alternative to quantitative expertise is less likely to be democracy than an unleashing of tabloid editors and demagogues to provide their own "truth" of what is going on across society.

统计——以及分析统计数据的专家——的权威不断下降，是这场被称为“后真相”政治的危机的核心。在这个不确定的新世界里，人们对定量专业知识的态度越来越分化。从某种角度看，以统计为基础的政治是精英主义的，不民主的，无视人们对社区和国家的情感投资。这只是伦敦、华盛顿或布鲁塞尔的特权人士将他们的世界观强加给其他人的又一种方式。从相反的角度看，统计学与精英主义完全相反。它们使记者、公民和政治家能够从整体上讨论社会问题，不是基于奇闻轶事、情绪或偏见，而是以切实可行的方式。除了量化专业知识之外，民主更不可能是民主，而是释放小报编辑和煽动者，提供他们自己的“真相”来了解整个社会正在发生的事情。

Is there a way out of this polarisation? Must we simply choose between a politics of facts and one of emotions, or is there another way of looking at this situation? One way is to view statistics through the lens of their history. We need to try and see them for what they are: neither unquestionable truths nor elite conspiracies, but rather as tools designed to simplify the job of government, for better or worse. Viewed historically, we can see what a crucial role statistics have played in our understanding of nation states and their progress. This raises the alarming question of how – if at all – we will continue to have common ideas of society and collective progress, should statistics fall by the wayside.

有办法摆脱这种两极分化吗？我们必须简单地在事实政治和情感政治之间做出选择，还是有别的方法来看待这种情况？一种方法是通过历史的镜头来看待统计数据。我们需要试着看清它们到底是什么：既不是不容置疑的事实，也不是精英的阴谋，而是旨在简化政府工作的工具，不管结果是好是坏。从历史上看，我们可以看到统计数据在我们理解民族国家及其发展过程中发挥了多么重要的作用。这就出现了一个令人震惊的问题：如果统计数据被抛在一边，我们如何(如果有的话)继续对社会和集体进步有共同的看法。