Quote

The same set of statistics can produce opposite conclusions at different levels of aggregation.

Thomas Sowell

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Thomas Sowell
Age: 94
Born: 1930
Born: June 30
Economist
University Teacher
Gastonia
North Carolina
Levels
Science
Aggregation
Different
Conclusions
Statistics
Conclusion
Opposite
Opposites
Produce

More quotes by Thomas Sowell

Image
Over the generations, black leaders have ranged from noble souls to shameless charlatans.
Thomas Sowell
Image
People who thing that they are getting something for nothing, by having government provide what they would otherwise have to buy in the private market, are not only kidding themselves by ignoring the taxes that government has to take from them in order to give them the appearance of something for nothing.
Thomas Sowell
Image
If you want to get each individual's honest opinion, you don't want that opinion to be influenced by others who are present, much less allow a group to coordinate what they are going to say.
Thomas Sowell
Image
Social Engineering - The art of replacing what works with what sounds good.
Thomas Sowell
Image
Much of the self-righteous nonsense that abounds on so many subjects cannot stand up to three questions: (1) Compared to what? (2) At what cost? and (3) What are the hard facts?.
Thomas Sowell
Image
...Politics is not about facts. It is about what politicians can get people to believe.
Thomas Sowell
Image
There is no bigger waste of time than doing 90% of what is necessary.
Thomas Sowell
Image
Nobody is equal to anybody. Even the same man is not equal to himself on different days.
Thomas Sowell
Image
Whenever someone refers to me as someone who happens to be black, I wonder if they realize that both my parents are black. If I had turned out to be Scandinavian or Chinese, people would have wondered what was going on.
Thomas Sowell
Image
Both history and contemporary data show that countries prosper more when there are stable and dependable rules, under which people can make investments without having to fear unpredictable new government interventions before these investments can pay off.
Thomas Sowell
Image
You cannot subsidize irresponsibility and expect people to become more responsible.
Thomas Sowell
Image
You may scoff at the Tooth Fairy if you like. But the Tooth Fairy's approach has gotten more politicians elected than any economist's analysis.
Thomas Sowell
Image
Some full professors could more accurately be described as empty professors.
Thomas Sowell
Image
In the wake of the housing debacle in California, more people are buying less expensive homes, making bigger down payments, and staying away from 'creative' and risky financing. It is amazing how fast people learn when they are not insulated from the consequences of their decisions.
Thomas Sowell
Image
Wise men wrote the Constitution, but clever judges have been destroying it, bit by bit, turning it into an instrument of arbitrary judicial power, instead of a limitation on all government power.
Thomas Sowell
Image
If you have been voting for politicians who promise to give you goodies at someone else's expense, then you have no right to complain when they take your money and give it to someone else, including themselves
Thomas Sowell
Image
If facts, logic, and scientific procedures are all just arbitrarily socially constructed notions, then all that is left is consensus--more specifically peer consensus, the kind of consensus that matters to adolescents or to many among the intelligentsia.
Thomas Sowell
Image
More than half of all people filing income tax forms use someone else to prepare the forms for them. Then they have to sign under penalty of perjury that these forms are correct. But if they were competent to determine that, why would they have to pay someone else to do their taxes for them in the first place?
Thomas Sowell
Image
What then is the intellectual advantage of civilization over primitive savagery? It is not necessarily that each civilized man has more knowledge but that he requires far less.
Thomas Sowell
Image
Liberals are very broadminded: they are always willing to give careful consideration to both sides of the same side
Thomas Sowell