The miracle study that was eleven mice
A headline promised a common spice reverses memory loss. Siti reads the actual paper, counts the mice, and explains how to get from a headline to the study in three clicks.
The chart with no axis
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Show notes
Where does the number come from
The first episode starts with a chart that passed through thousands of Malaysian family groups last month, apparently showing crime tripling in a single city. Siti traces it to its source and finds a missing axis, a changed category definition and a screenshot cut off at the wrong year.
- Who made the chart, and who shared it first
- Four questions to ask any chart before you believe it
- Why a changed definition can look like a real rise
- The base rate, explained with a cinema car park
Fallacy of the week: the appeal to the uncle who works in government. Send in something you fell for through the show page.
Transcript
Hello, selamat datang, and welcome to Wait, Is That True. I am Siti Nurhaliza Rahman. I spent six years checking facts in a newsroom, and I learned that the problem is rarely that people are stupid. The problem is that a claim arrives dressed up, and nobody taught us how to undress it. So that is this show. Each week, one claim, and the moves you can use to check it yourself. Today, a chart. You may have seen it. It appears to show crime tripling in one city in three years, and it went through my own family's group twice. I found where it came from, and the story is much more interesting than the chart. I will give you four questions to ask any chart before you forward it. You are listening on Witspeak Podcasts.
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