David Spiegelhalter

David Spiegelhalter discusses with Ivan six things which he thinks should be better known.

Professor Sir David Spiegelhalter is Chair of the Winton Centre for Risk and Evidence Communication in the University of Cambridge, which aims to improve the way that statistical evidence is used by health professionals, patients, lawyers and judges, media and policy-makers. He advises organisations and government agencies on risk communication and is a regular media commentator on statistical issues, with a particular focus on communicating uncertainty.

His background is in medical statistics, and he has over 200 refereed publications and is co-author of 6 textbooks, as well as The Norm Chronicles (with Michael Blastland), and Sex by Numbers. He works extensively with the media, and presented the BBC4 documentaries Tails you Win: the Science of Chance, the award-winning Climate Change by Numbers, and in 2011 came seventh in an episode of BBC1’s Winter Wipeout.

He was elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 2005, and knighted in 2014 for services to medical statistics. He was President of the Royal Statistical Society for 2017-2018. His bestselling book, The Art of Statistics, was published in March 2019.

He is @d_spiegel on Twitter, and his home page is http://www.statslab.cam.ac.uk/~david/

1. Alan Bennett reading Winnie the Pooh https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v08/n22/alan-bennett/diary
2. Ilfracombe https://www.visitilfracombe.co.uk/see-do/
3. Whelks https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/food-and-drink/features/whelks-are-healthy-versatile-and-sustainable-so-why-did-we-stop-eating-them-in-the-uk-9598928.html
4. Riddley Walker by Russell Hoban https://www.theguardian.com/books/2010/dec/04/riddley-walker-russell-hoban-book-club
5. The Singing Detective https://www.npr.org/2012/02/24/147037460/25-years-later-the-singing-detective-still-shines?t=1591547850222
6. Poisson distribution https://understandinguncertainty.org/another-tragic-cluster-how-surprised-should-we-be

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