Meditation On A Statistic
A number is as stark as a poem
And who’s to tell
That information thus constrained
May not be beautiful
Two dates delimit a man’s life
But none would pretend
That dates describe his character -
Or feelings comprehend
A number gives a simple frame
On which to spread
A half-seen tapestry - of life,
or work, or truth discerned
I will not own that numbers limit
What we feel or see
They give thought form, direction,
And paradoxically
A number’s very bluntness
Can set our thoughts free
Explanation
This feels a bit pretentious but for the benefit of my students and others who are not used to unusual English words and poetry I will point out a few puns and word meanings.
"stark" means bare and without ornamentation. Both numbers and poems exist by themselves, usually without comment, and invite us to think hard about their meaning.
"who's to tell" is a pun on tell as communicate, or tell as understand, or an old-fashioned use of tell as to add up, as we see in the phrase "bank teller".
The second verse says that though we use statistics we don't think about people as mere statistics. "Two dates delimit" on a gravestone, saying a person's dates of birth and death, but what we remember is the person's flesh-and-blood humanity and character. "Comprehend" in archaic English meant to hold everything (together). These days it means to fully understand.
The third verse imples that the important thing is not the number but the story, the understanding, that we make from it. As in a tapestry, we weave in lots of insights, but without the number there is no solidity behind the story and it will fall to the ground.
"I will not own" - I refuse to accept that looking at numbers restricts or debases our attention in matters of humanity. Rather they give us a point of departure for our thinking, and the very bluntness of a number should provoke us to question and embellish its meaning.
- © Barry McDonald 27/3/2000
- Published in Chance, 13(4), p7.(A publication of the American Statistical Association, 2000).
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