Allen B. Downey, "Probably Overthinking It: How to Use Data to Answer Questions, Avoid Statistical Traps, and Make Better Decisions" (U Chicago Press, 2023)

Oct 10, 2025

Guest Allen B. Downey, a renowned author and data scientist, discusses the critical role of statistical thinking in everyday life. He highlights common pitfalls like the base rate fallacy and selection bias that can lead to grave misinterpretations in fields such as public health and social justice. Downey explains how his work aims to demystify complex concepts like logarithmic distributions and the challenges of modeling rare events. He also shares insights on improving data literacy, emphasizing the importance of critical thinking in interpreting statistics.

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INSIGHT

Data Can Clarify Or Mislead

Data can both clarify the world and distort it depending on interpretation.
Allen Downey emphasizes a positive message: learn to use data wisely rather than fear it.

ANECDOTE

Everyone Is Equally Weird

The Air Force found no pilots average on 10 measurements and none on 96 measurements either.
Downey uses this to show that with many dimensions, everyone is outside the mean in some ways.

INSIGHT

Why Your Friends Seem More Popular

The friendship paradox arises from selection bias: popular people are oversampled when picking friends.
This inspection paradox makes your friends appear more popular than you on average.

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Statistics are everywhere: in news reports, at the doctor's office, and in every sort of forecast, from the stock market to the weather. Blogger, teacher, and computer scientist Allen B. Downey knows well that people have an innate ability both to understand statistics and to be fooled by them. As he makes clear in this accessible introduction to statistical thinking, the stakes are big. Simple misunderstandings have led to incorrect medical prognoses, underestimated the likelihood of large earthquakes, hindered social justice efforts, and resulted in dubious policy decisions. There are right and wrong ways to look at numbers, and Downey will help you see which are which.

Probably Overthinking It: How to Use Data to Answer Questions, Avoid Statistical Traps, and Make Better Decisions (University of Chicago Press, 2023) uses real data to delve into real examples with real consequences, drawing on cases from health campaigns, political movements, chess rankings, and more. He lays out common pitfalls--like the base rate fallacy, length-biased sampling, and Simpson's paradox--and shines a light on what we learn when we interpret data correctly, and what goes wrong when we don't. Using data visualizations instead of equations, he builds understanding from the basics to help you recognize errors, whether in your own thinking or in media reports. Even if you have never studied statistics--or if you have and forgot everything you learned--this book will offer new insight into the methods and measurements that help us understand the world.

Allen B. Downey is a curriculum designer at the online learning company Brilliant and professor emeritus of computer science at Olin College.

Gregory McNiff is a Managing Director in the New York office of the Blueshirt Group, an IR firm focused on technology. Greg holds an MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, an M. Litt. in Shakespeare Studies from the University of St. Andrews and a B.A. in Classical Languages from Columbia University.

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