Picturing the Uncertain World

Picturing the Uncertain World PDF Author: Howard Wainer
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 1400832896
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 264

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Book Description
In his entertaining and informative book Graphic Discovery, Howard Wainer unlocked the power of graphical display to make complex problems clear. Now he's back with Picturing the Uncertain World, a book that explores how graphs can serve as maps to guide us when the information we have is ambiguous or incomplete. Using a visually diverse sampling of graphical display, from heartrending autobiographical displays of genocide in the Kovno ghetto to the "Pie Chart of Mystery" in a New Yorker cartoon, Wainer illustrates the many ways graphs can be used--and misused--as we try to make sense of an uncertain world. Picturing the Uncertain World takes readers on an extraordinary graphical adventure, revealing how the visual communication of data offers answers to vexing questions yet also highlights the measure of uncertainty in almost everything we do. Are cancer rates higher or lower in rural communities? How can you know how much money to sock away for retirement when you don't know when you'll die? And where exactly did nineteenth-century novelists get their ideas? These are some of the fascinating questions Wainer invites readers to consider. Along the way he traces the origins and development of graphical display, from William Playfair, who pioneered the use of graphs in the eighteenth century, to instances today where the public has been misled through poorly designed graphs. We live in a world full of uncertainty, yet it is within our grasp to take its measure. Read Picturing the Uncertain World and learn how.

Acting in an Uncertain World

Acting in an Uncertain World PDF Author: Michel Callon
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262515962
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 301

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Book Description
A call for a new form of democracy in which “hybrid forums” composed of experts and laypeople address such sociotechnical controversies as hazardous waste, genetically modified organisms, and nanotechnology. Controversies over such issues as nuclear waste, genetically modified organisms, asbestos, tobacco, gene therapy, avian flu, and cell phone towers arise almost daily as rapid scientific and technological advances create uncertainty and bring about unforeseen concerns. The authors of Acting in an Uncertain World argue that political institutions must be expanded and improved to manage these controversies, to transform them into productive conversations, and to bring about “technical democracy.” They show how “hybrid forums”—in which experts, non-experts, ordinary citizens, and politicians come together—reveal the limits of traditional delegative democracies, in which decisions are made by quasi-professional politicians and techno-scientific information is the domain of specialists in laboratories. The division between professionals and laypeople, the authors claim, is simply outmoded. The authors argue that laboratory research should be complemented by everyday experimentation pursued in the real world, and they describe various modes of cooperation between the two. They explore a range of concrete examples of hybrid forums that have dealt with sociotechnical controversies including nuclear waste disposal in France, industrial waste and birth defects in Japan, a childhood leukemia cluster in Woburn, Massachusetts, and mad cow disease in the United Kingdom. The authors discuss the implications for political decision making in general and describe a “dialogic” democracy that enriches traditional representative democracy. To invent new procedures for consultation and representation, they suggest, is to contribute to an endless process that is necessary for the ongoing democratization of democracy.

Twenty-one Mental Models That Can Change Policing

Twenty-one Mental Models That Can Change Policing PDF Author: Renée J. Mitchell
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000402754
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 255

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Book Description
This book goes beyond other police leadership books to teach practitioners how to think about policing in a structured way that synthesizes criminological theory, statistics, research design, applied research, and what works and what doesn’t in policing into Mental Models. A Mental Model is a representation of how something works. Using a Mental Model framework to simplify complex concepts, readers will take away an in-depth understanding of how cognitive biases affect our ability to understand and interpret data, what empirical research says about effective police interventions, how statistical data should be structured for management meetings, and how to evaluate interventions for efficiency and effectiveness. While evidence-based practice is critical to advancing the police profession, it is limited in scope, and is only part of what is necessary to support sustainable change in policing. Policing requires a scientifically based framework to understand and interpret data in a way that minimizes cognitive bias to allow for better responses to complex problems. Data and research have advanced so rapidly in the last several decades that it is difficult for even the most ambitious of police leaders to keep pace. The Twenty-one Mental Models were synthesized to create a framework for any police, public, or community leader to better understand how cognitive bias contributes to misunderstanding data and gives the reader the tools to overcome those biases to better serve their communities. The book is intended for a wide range of audiences, including law enforcement and community leaders; scholars and policy experts who specialize in policing; students of criminal justice, organizations, and management; reporters and journalists; individuals who aspire to police careers; and citizen consumers of information about policing. Anyone who is going to make decisions about their communities based on data has a responsibility to be numerate and this book Twenty-one Mental Models That Can Change Policing: A Framework For Using Data and Research For Overcoming Cognitive Bias, will help you become just that.

Mapping AIDS

Mapping AIDS PDF Author: Lukas Engelmann
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108425771
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 267

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Book Description
Offers an innovative study of visual traditions in modern medical history through debates about the causes, impact and spread of AIDS.

The Success Equation

The Success Equation PDF Author: Michael J. Mauboussin
Publisher: Harvard Business Press
ISBN: 1422184234
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 312

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Book Description
In this provocative book, Michael Mauboussin offers the structure needed to analyze the relative importance of skill and luck, offering concrete suggestions for making these insights work to your advantage by making better decisions.

Principles of Risk Analysis

Principles of Risk Analysis PDF Author: Charles Yoe
Publisher: CRC Press
ISBN: 0429667612
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 816

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Book Description
In every decision problem there are things we know and things we do not know. Risk analysis science uses the best available evidence to assess what we know while it is carefully intentional in the way it addresses the importance of the things we do not know in the evaluation of decision choices and decision outcomes. The field of risk analysis science continues to expand and grow and the second edition of Principles of Risk Analysis: Decision Making Under Uncertainty responds to this evolution with several significant changes. The language has been updated and expanded throughout the text and the book features several new areas of expansion including five new chapters. The book’s simple and straightforward style—based on the author’s decades of experience as a risk analyst, trainer, and educator—strips away the mysterious aura that often accompanies risk analysis. Features: Details the tasks of risk management, risk assessment, and risk communication in a straightforward, conceptual manner Provides sufficient detail to empower professionals in any discipline to become risk practitioners Expands the risk management emphasis with a new chapter to serve private industry and a growing public sector interest in the growing practice of enterprise risk management Describes dozens of quantitative and qualitative risk assessment tools in a new chapter Practical guidance and ideas for using risk science to improve decisions and their outcomes is found in a new chapter on decision making under uncertainty Practical methods for helping risk professionals to tell their risk story are the focus of a new chapter Features an expanded set of examples of the risk process that demonstrate the growing applications of risk analysis As before, this book continues to appeal to professionals who want to learn and apply risk science in their own professions as well as students preparing for professional careers. This book remains a discipline free guide to the principles of risk analysis that is accessible to all interested practitioners. Files used in the creation of this book and additional exercises as well as a free student version of Palisade Corporation’s Decision Tools Suite software are available with the purchase of this book. A less detailed introduction to the risk analysis science tasks of risk management, risk assessment, and risk communication is found in Primer of Risk Analysis: Decision Making Under Uncertainty, Second Edition, ISBN: 978-1-138-31228-9.

The Starry Sky Within

The Starry Sky Within PDF Author: Anna Henchman
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199686963
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 313

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Book Description
The Starry Sky Within is an innovative study of previously unexplored connections between nineteenth-century astronomy and British literature. Nineteenth-century astronomers revealed a staggeringly mobile world extending far beyond the scope of human vision and Henchman examines how this discovery inspired the novelists of the day.

Design for Information

Design for Information PDF Author: Isabel Meirelles
Publisher:
ISBN: 1592538061
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 227

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Book Description
Design for Information provides a series of visualizations that are analyzed for their design principles and methods. This book provides critical and analytical tools that benefit the design process.

Data Visualization and Statistical Literacy for Open and Big Data

Data Visualization and Statistical Literacy for Open and Big Data PDF Author: Prodromou, Theodosia
Publisher: IGI Global
ISBN: 1522525130
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 365

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Book Description
Data visualization has emerged as a serious scholarly topic, and a wide range of tools have recently been developed at an accelerated pace to aid in this research area. Examining different ways of analyzing big data can result in increased efficiency for many corporations and organizations. Data Visualization and Statistical Literacy for Open and Big Data highlights methodological developments in the way that data analytics is both learned and taught. Featuring extensive coverage on emerging relevant topics such as data complexity, statistics education, and curriculum development, this publication is geared toward teachers, academicians, students, engineers, professionals, and researchers that are interested in expanding their knowledge of data examination and analysis.

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Tables

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Tables PDF Author: Andreas Krause
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 1461453291
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 437

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Book Description
This book is devoted to the graphics of patient data: good graphs enabling straight¬forward and intuitive interpretation, efficient creation, and straightforward interpretation. We focus on easy access to graphics of patient data: the intention is to show a large variety of graphs for different phases of drug development, together with a description of what the graph shows, what type of data it uses, and what options there are. The main aim is to provide inspiration in form of a “graphics cookbook.” Many graphs provide creative ideas about what can be done. The book is not intended to be technical. It introduces general principles of good visualization to make readers understand the concepts, but the main focus is on the creativity and usefulness: readers are enabled to browse through the book to get ideas of how their own data can be analyzed graphically. For additional information visit Editor’s companion website: http://www.elmo.ch/doc/life-science-graphics/