# What is your favorite “data analysis” cartoon?

This is one of my favorites:

One entry per answer. This is in the vein of the Stack Overflow question What’s your favorite “programmer” cartoon?.

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I do have to ask though- how come cartoons are in and jokes are out? – Sharpie Jul 22 '10 at 5:09
These cartoons are useful too; they can be included in a lecture on a particular topic where you are trying to explain a concept (e.g. correlation/causation above). A little humor can help to keep an audience engaged. – Shane Jul 22 '10 at 14:22
According to the tour, this question should be closed, since it is a question that has "too many possible answers" and since it is "primarily opinion-based". I'm not complaining, just surprised it has stayed open for this long. – Flimm Dec 9 '14 at 10:29

Was XKCD, so time for Dilbert:

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Absolutely love this one. – Sharpie Jul 21 '10 at 15:23
Did anyone else notice that the tour guide changes colors between the second and third frames? – Max Aug 22 '12 at 20:41
On RANDU: "We guarantee that each number is random individually, but we don't guarantee that more than one of them is random." – Iain Elder Mar 18 '14 at 15:11

My favourite Dilbert cartoon:

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Definitively my favorite cartoon about Data Mining – steffen Dec 1 '10 at 12:24

Another from XKCD:

Mentioned here and here.

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You can't read this one without the alt text. it said something like "But because of that we're totally breaking up" – generic_user Mar 10 '14 at 18:16

One of my favorites from xckd:

## Random Number

RFC 1149.5 specifies 4 as the standard IEEE-vetted random number.

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One more Dilbert cartoon:

...

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This one reminds me of the recent bailout in the States, where they just made up 700 billion number - they said they just wanted a really large number. :) – Roman Luštrik Aug 12 '10 at 8:53
Fixed. I had to add some dots after the cartoon since SE didn't allow me to submit the changes :-\ – Ching Chong Feb 5 at 11:30

From: A visual comparison of normal and paranormal distributions Matthew Freeman J Epidemiol Community Health 2006;60:6. Lower caption says 'Paranormal Distribution' - no idea why the graphical artifact is occuring.

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I think this version of the joke works better (from oneweirdkerneltrick.com), though apparently this version was seven years earlier. – Dougal Feb 3 at 1:06

'So, uh, we did the green study again and got no link. It was probably a--' 'RESEARCH CONFLICTED ON GREEN JELLY BEAN/ACNE LINK; MORE STUDY RECOMMENDED!'

xkcd: significant

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This is by far my favorite cartoon of all time. It's super educational. It really gets to the heart of the definition of a p-value. In fact, I bet that less than 10% the students who pass a college freshman "intro to stats" class get this joke, and this makes me sad. – MHH Jan 15 '14 at 3:36
Maybe so! Fortunately for freshmen, @Glen_b has offered an excellent breakdown here. – Nick Stauner Feb 27 '14 at 1:03

I just came across this and loved it:

(http://xkcd.com/795/).

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This isn't technically a cartoon, but close enough:

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That's definitely my favorite. I always have to stop on this and laugh when scrolling over this page. It's just so bad!! – Henrik Sep 9 '10 at 9:02

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That's great. The standard way of dealing with outliers. – Shane Jul 26 '10 at 20:06
Who's the artist? – blubb Sep 25 '14 at 16:01

By the third trimester, there will be hundreds of babies inside you.

Also from XKCD

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There is this one on Bayesian learning:

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Another from XKCD:

And if you labeled your axes, I could tell you exactly how MUCH better.

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this too:

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Nice. The importance of variance when thinking about a population.

Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal

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And another one from xkcd.

Title: Self-Description

The mouseover text:

The contents of any one panel are dependent on the contents of every panel including itself. The graph of panel dependencies is complete and bidirectional, and each node has a loop. The mouseover text has two hundred and forty-two characters.

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Another one from xkcd:

Alt-text:

Hell, my eighth grade science class managed to conclusively reject it just based on a classroom experiment. It's pretty sad to hear about million-dollar research teams who can't even manage that.

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More about design and power than analysis, but I like this one

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I liked this one:

This is probably fun to show in class as well...

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A classic...

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@rolando2 As a medical researcher, I find the sensationalist incompetence of mainstream science reporters hilarious. – Superbest Feb 26 '14 at 12:08

I found this from a NoSQL presentation, but the cartoon can be found directly at

http://browsertoolkit.com/fault-tolerance.png

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Can you please explain this cartoon? – Christian Sep 3 '14 at 0:00

Allright, I think this one is hilarious- but let's see if it passes the Statistical Analysis Miller test.

## Fermirotica

I love how Google handles dimensional analysis. Stats are ballpark and vary wildly by time of day and whether your mom is in town.

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Statistical voyeurism? And there we were wondering what to call the site... – walkytalky Jul 23 '10 at 15:48

Found this one in the comments on Andrew Gelman's blog.

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From xkcd:

This is data analysis in the form of a cartoon, and I find it particularly poignant.

The universe is probably littered with the one-planet graves of cultures which made the sensible economic decision that there's no good reason to go into space--each discovered, studied, and remembered by the ones who made the irrational decision.

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Another one from xkcd:

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Bananas are always tasty. – Anonymous Type Dec 1 '10 at 4:00

From xkcd:

If some people who really believe that everything should be scientifically tested would actually walk their talk than they this comic might even show an event that actually happens.

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yeah but.... this one isn't true... it mostly depends on how you parameterize the time variable $t$... i guess if you go back far enough, but come on... – William Sep 22 '11 at 17:24