Lawnmower v terrorist risk: the saga continues

Kim Kardashian's tweet comparing risk from lawnmowers v terrorists triggered the award and debate

Yesterday Significance Magazine (the magazine of the Royal Statistical Society and the American Statistical Association) published an article “Lawnmowers versus Terrorists”  with the strapline:

The Royal Statistical Society’s first ‘International Statistic of the Year’ sparked plenty of online discussion. Here, Norman Fenton and Martin Neil argue against the choice of winner, while Nick Thieme writes in support.

Our case, titled “A highly misleading view of risk”, was an edited version of a paper  previously publicised in a blog post that itself followed up on original concerns raised by Nicholas Nassim Taleb about the RSS citation and the way it had been publicised. The ‘opposing’ case made by Nick Thieme was essentially a critique of our paper.

We have today published a response to Nick’s critique.


Links:

• Norman Fenton,Martin Neil,Nick Thieme "Lawnmowers versus terrorists" Significance Magazine Volume 15, Issue 1,February 2018 Pages 12–13
• Norman Fenton and Martin Neil We have today also published a response to Nick’s critique: http://dx.doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.30958.72002 
• Are lawnmowers a greater risk than terrorists?
• On lawnmowers and terrorists again: the danger of using historical data alone for decision-making