Numbers

I haven't delved deeply into the study of statistics, but I know enough and I feel like I know more than most people.

There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies and statistics.

That quote is the best place to start. A statistics reduce the world to a relational-quantitative perspective. If I tell you that I have 3 apples, I'm reporting a statistic. If I tell you that I have 1% of the apples from my neighbor's tree, I've reported another statistic and providing you with the information needed to infer that that the yield of my neighbor's tree was 300 apples. If I tell you, 1% of the apples from my neighbor's tree were reported stolen, you might be tempted to guess that I stole them; the numbers match up, 3 were stolen and I have 3 in my possession. That is a coincidence, yielding circumstantial evidence.