Skip to main content

The Hidden Half - Michael Blastland *****

Michael Blastland is co-author of one of my favourite titles on the use and misuse of numbers, The Tiger that Isn't - so I was excited to see this book and wasn't disappointed.

Blastland opens with the story of a parthenogenic crustacean that seems to demonstrate that, despite having near-identical nature and nurture, a collection of the animals vary hugely in size, length of life and practically every other measure. This is used to introduce us to the idea that our science deals effectively with the easy bit, the 'half' that is accessible, but that in many circumstances there is a hidden half that comprises a whole range of very small factors which collectively can have a huge impact, but which are pretty much impossible to predict or account for. (I put 'half' in inverted commas as it might be fairer to say 'part' - there's no suggestion that this is exactly 50:50.)

We go on to discover this hidden half turning up in all kinds of applications of science and maths from economics to healthcare, from the lives of individuals who were delinquent as children to measuring the benefit (or not) of giving a poor family a cow. Blastland picks out a number of factors that tend to mislead us - that as humans we aren't consistent in our responses, that things change with location and time, that the way research is undertaken can generate false results, that principles can mislead us and far more. As he points out, what this does is make us aware of the limitations of applied maths (particularly economics) and science. He is not saying we shouldn't use them - they are far better than the alternatives - but we have to be aware of their limitations.

At the end of the book, Blastland comes up with some suggestions for dealing with the hidden half. It isn't going to go away, and there are no easy solutions, but he does have some interesting ideas on mitigation. For example, he suggests we should experiment more (with political policies, for example), remember that we are betting on knowledge rather than making use of certainty and, for me, most importantly that scientists, journalists and politicians should do more to communicate the uncertainty involved. It's not that we want our politicians to be hesitant, but it would be far better if they made it clear that there are very few clear linkages between policies and outcomes. I was particularly struck by some data on GDP figures. The media and politicians often spend ages agonising over a GDP change of, say 0.2 per cent. The headline figures are revised over time as better data is available: Blastland points out that a typical correction might be 0.4 per cent up or down (and can be as high as 1 per cent). This makes it very clear that making pronouncements based on a 0.2 per cent change is futile and highly misleading.

My only criticism is that I felt that the book could have done with even more specific examples: in this kind of book, it's the examples that have the real bite and savour. Blastland spends a bit too long philosophising on the hidden half in a way that feels a little repetitive. It's not there aren't great examples (plenty more than the ones mentioned above), it was just for me that the ratio of examples to musings wasn't quite right. A brief mention also to the cover design - it's very clever (though I couldn't help thinking it had been put on wrong and wanting to re-position it).

We are getting more books now about the reality of applied maths (particularly economics) and science, which is an extremely good thing, provided the message is carried through to journalists and others who have to communicate these matters to the public. An excellent book.
Hardback:  

Kindle:  
Using these links earns us commission at no cost to you
Review by Brian Clegg
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Meteorite Hunters - Joshua Howgego *****

This is an extremely engaging read on a subject that everyone is aware of, but few of us know much detail about. Usually, if I'm honest, geology tends to be one of the least entertaining scientific subjects but here (I suppose, given that geo- refers to the Earth it ought to be astrology... but that might be a touch misleading). Here, though, there is plenty of opportunity to capture our interest. The first part of the book takes us both to see meteorites and to hear stories of meteorite hunters, whose exploits vary from erudite science trips to something more like an Indiana Jones outing. Joshua Howgego takes us back to the earliest observations and discoveries of meteorites and the initial doubt that they could have extraterrestrial sources, through to explorations of deserts and the Antarctic - both locations where it tends to be easier to find them. I, certainly, had no idea about the use of camera networks to track incoming meteors, which not only try to estimate where they wi...
Post a Comment
Read more

Against the Odds - John Gribbin and Mary Gribbin ****

The number of women working in STEM subjects has expanded dramatically, but as John and Mary Gribbin make clear, in the history of science this is a very recent occurrence. Here, they bring us the stories of 12 women, from Eunice Newton Foote, born in 1819, to Vera Rubin, born in 1928 - effectively covering nearly 200 years in that Rubin died as recently as 2016. There are some names that will already be familiar from popular science histories (and deservedly so). You will find, for instance, Dorothy Hodgkin and Rosalind Franklin represented. But there are plenty like Foote that few will have come across, including Inge Lehmann, Chien-Sung Wu and Lucy Slater. While arguably Foote is there primarily to demonstrate the difficulties she faced (her discovery of an aspect of greenhouse gas behaviour was independently bettered within weeks), the rest have all made significant discoveries or developments against the odds and often missed out the recognition the deserved. The most prominent ob...
Post a Comment
Read more

Pagans (SF) - James Alistair Henry *****

There's a fascinating sub-genre of science fiction known as alternate history. The idea is that at some point in the past, history diverged from reality, resulting in a different present. Perhaps the most acclaimed of these books is Kingsley Amis's The Alteration , set in a modern England where there had not been a reformation - but James Alistair Henry arguably does even better by giving us a present where Britain is a third world country, still divided between Celts in the west and Saxons in the East. Neither the Normans nor Christianity have any significant impact. In itself this is a clever idea, but what makes it absolutely excellent is mixing in a police procedural murder mystery, where the investigation is being undertaken by a Celtic DI, Drustan, who has to work in London alongside Aedith, a Saxon reeve of equivalent rank, who also happens to be daughter of the Earl of Mercia. While you could argue about a few historical aspects, it's effectively done and has a plot...
Post a Comment
Read more