Critiquing figures

2025-03-06

Rick Gilmore

Prelude

In the news

Zhang & Igielnik (2025)

In the news

Geiger (2025)

Geiger (2025)

Geiger (2025)

Geiger (2025)

“On gun violence, the united states is an outlier” (n.d.)

“On gun violence, the united states is an outlier” (n.d.)

Announcements

• Due: Final Project proposal
• Due: Exercise 04
• Assigned: Exercise 05

Today’s topics

• Critiquing figures
• Work session

Critiquing figures

Edward Tufte

• Professor Emeritus, Yale University
• Statistics, Political Science, Computer Science
• Leading authority in data visualization and information design

https://www.edwardtufte.com/online-course/

Figures can enlighten

Tufte (2001)

Tufte (2001)

Figures can delight

Tufte (2001)

Figures can mislead

Tufte (2001)

Spurious correlations

https://www.tylervigen.com/spurious-correlations

• Correlation \(\neq\) causation, but
• Zero correlation \(\rightarrow\) no causal relationship

Tufte (2001)

Tufte (2001)

Tufte (2001)

Tufte (2001)

Exercise 05 overview

• Link to assignment

Work session

DataCamp status

DataCamp leaderboard

Resources

References

Geiger, A. (2025, March 5). What the data says about gun deaths in the U.S. Retrieved March 6, 2025, from https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/03/05/what-the-data-says-about-gun-deaths-in-the-us/

On gun violence, the united states is an outlier. (n.d.). Retrieved March 6, 2025, from https://www.healthdata.org/news-events/insights-blog/acting-data/gun-violence-united-states-outlier

Tufte, E. R. (2001). The Visual Display of Quantitative Information. Graphics Pr.

Zhang, C., & Igielnik, R. (2025, March 4). How americans feel about trump’s tariffs. The New York Times. The New York Times. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/03/04/polls/tariffs-trump-poll.html