Rowan Tree and Red Thread

Quite a nice article here on teaching 'risk literacy' or a basic familiarity with probability and statistics to secondary school children, and encouraging the ability to ask questions about the numbers and figures we're told in the media.

The nice closer from the article:

Professor Spiegelhalter’s four rules of risk, which he says everyone should know

Stuff happens We cannot predict exactly how every precise event will turn out, but we can often predict the overall pattern of events surprisingly well.

Compare like with like If you want to show that speed cameras reduce road traffic accident rates, don’t just put them in places that have just had a run of accidents.

What am I not being told? This person may well have got better after she took this wonder treatment, but how many other people’s stories are not being featured?

Twice not-very-much is still not very much Increasing a tiny risk may not be so important: almost everything interesting might help and it might also harm. The trick is working out the balance for you.

Reading iamnikchick's LJ I saw the sad news of Erick Wujick's death. It's been a bad year for the great names in our hobby, and he will be missed.

Erick's Amber Diceless Roleplaying provided me and my friends with possibly the best and most fondly remembered campaign of my gaming career. Thanks Erick.

This is bad news, as echoed at numerous other more up to date blogs than my own.

Just a couple of hours ago a bus careened down our street, struck a passing car and ploughed into the wall across the road from our house. We're trying not to think about what would have happened if it had swerved left and not right.

There were great numbers of fire engines, ambulances, gardai (the Irish police) and even greater numbers of rubberneckers.

Rowan was super excited and bedtime was a little extended as a result.

and in other news, black is white and night is day.

Thanks to pompe for pointing out this White House press release.

*boggle*

Well it's about bloody time.

The IRA statement in full. Blogland quicker off the mark than the BBC apparently too.