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March 30, 2005
Autism and Google versus Math, or A Little Research Is A Dangerous Thing
Tyler Cowen at the economist blog Marginal Revolution complains that the rise of autism diagnoses in America from 1 in 2500 to 1 in 166 seems like an urban legend: he can't find any reputable citations for the "1 in 166" figure on Google.
Tyler, that's probably because you didn't think to rewrite the 1/166 as 6/1000. Looking for "autism 6 1000" gets you this citation, among others.
There's some kind of point here about unspoken knowledge: when I, with an excessive math background, see "1 in 166", I immediately recognize that as a rewriting of "6 in 1000". But Tyler didn't, despite being an economist (which is plenty mathematical).
The other point is the one we all know: never confuse "what I find on Google" with "everything there is to learn". Not this decade, anyway.
Posted by danielstarr at March 30, 2005 01:39 PM
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