Microlives and the Art of Uncertainty with Sir David Spiegelhalter
Carlsberg don't do statisticians, but if they did...
Our most recent podcast was a conversation with “probably the UK’s greatest statistician”, and author of a new book The Art of Uncertainty, Sir David Spiegelhalter. It was so fun and interesting I’ve listened to it twice and enjoyed it the second time as much as the first. I’m going to tell you why I think you should listen to it, but here’s the link if you just want to get to it:
Microlives & The Art of Uncertainty with Sir David Spiegelhalter (podcast page)
Listen on YouTube
(I’ve been moving podcasts to a new YouTube channel in case you want to subscribe)
We started with two of my favourite concepts, and rather old sketches, the micromort and microlife. The microlife being of David’s own creation:
As I was listening I jotted down some of the surprising things I learned from David in the conversation (I had to trim extensively to get down to this):
What ties smoking 2 cigarettes, eating a bacon sandwich, and sitting in front of the TV for 2 hours a day
How to gain microlives and extend your life expectancy (hint: coffee 🙌)
The difference between acute risks (skydiving) and chronic risks (smoking cigarettes)
Which professions regularly exceed the acceptable risk of dying per year
Why politicians should admit when they don’t know
Whether you should plan everything on your holiday or just wing it
The difference between being resilient and being robust
Why we actually love not knowing what’s going to happen
The statistician who could flip a head every time
Why the order of cards in your card deck is unique in the history of the world
How David can win any coin toss if you challenge him
As a bonus, David is funny and remarkably humble.
David’s most recent book The Art of Uncertainty: How to Navigate Chance, Ignorance, Risk and Luck, explores many of the ideas we discuss in this episode and a host more.
David has written a host of books such as The Art of Statistics, Sex by Numbers and COVID by Numbers (he advised, fixed and make sense of the numbers during the pandemic).
Whether you consider yourself an expert on statistics or calculating an average is about your limit, based on all the relevant factors, I predict you’ll enjoy listening to David on the podcast. I hope you’ll give it a try.