We find ourselves somewhat ticked off. Not because people are trying to persuade us of something, that's just normal. But that they're willing to, umm, brush over perhaps, the numbers in order to convince us of their desired course of action. And that's not the way it should be: numbers are important, the proper appreciation and quotation of them allows us to actuallly work out what is the truth of any matter. Yes that isn't how they are being used. On the NHS and the exploding livers brought about by booze:
The recent report into life on the liver ward makes sobering reading. John has alcohol-induced dementia (Korsakoff’s syndrome) and doesn’t know where he is. Rita has cirrhosis of the liver and is homeless. Her life has spiralled downwards as a wine habit segued into damaging dependence. It’s easy to feel sorry for the Johns and Ritas, though most of us think it’ll never happen to us.
But will it? Are we becoming a nation of drinkers and drunks? The UK death rate from liver disease has increased fourfold in the past 30 years as cheap alcohol has flooded our shores and our gullets.
In the rest of the piece it actually says nothing at all about possible other causes of such cirrhosis or liver disease. Which is odd:
Common causes of cirrhosis are long-term alcohol abuse, hepatitis B and C infection, and fatty liver disease. Of those, hepatitis B and C together are said to be the leading cause of cirrhosis (WHO).
Agreed, that second number is not coming from the UK but there's obviously some amount of those other causes going on. That someone wants to persuade us to drink less, well, go ahead. But can't you do it using the actual and real numbers? And then of course there's Bill McKibben:
I’ve spent much of my life chronicling the ongoing tragedies stemming from global warming: the floods and droughts and storms, the failed harvests and forced migrations. But no single item on the list seems any more horrible than the emerging news from South America about the newly prominent Zika disease.
Spread by mosquitoes whose range inexorably expands as the climate warms,
Or as implied, Zika is caused by climate change. Well, no. This is the spread of a virus into the extant mosquito populations of the areas affected.
And yes, we do think this is important. Because numbers are the secret to science and science is how we make sense of the world. Rather than rejecting the Demon Rum or worshipping Gaia. as the sign says, "Down With This Sort Of Thing". If we want to discuss what we should do about the world let us do it on the basis of facts: as represented by actual numbers, not incantations pulled out from who knows where.