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Lies, Damned Lies and Cat Statistics

spopepro writes "While un-captioned cats might be of limited interest to the /. community, I found this column on how a fabricated statistic takes on a life of its own interesting. Starting with the Humane Society of the United States' (HSUS) claim that the unsterilized offspring of a cat will '...result in 420,000 cats in 5 years,' the author looks at other erroneous numbers, where they came from and why they won't go away."

6 of 175 comments (clear)

  1. No Don't Ruin This, I Need This! by eldavojohn · · Score: 4, Funny

    When I was a kid, I used to sit there smashing mosquitoes that bit me. Every time I smashed one fat with blood, I relished the idea that I had just killed a female mosquito who was about to lay thousands of eggs. And those mosquitoes would in turn breed and lay thousands of eggs and I had essentially just ended the lives of an infinite number of mosquitoes!

    Please, just let me have this -- your environmental constraints and logical reasoning be damned!

    --
    My work here is dung.
  2. Uncaptioned? by Monkeedude1212 · · Score: 3, Funny

    That just means we have the opportunity to make our own captions!

    i can haz kitenz?

    Go Go Gadget Pointless Thread:

    1. Re:Uncaptioned? by jd · · Score: 3, Funny

      Unkaptshunned Kittehs aer a kryme agaynst kitteh-hood. Unless dey're orinj. Teh orinj wuns aer poyson.

      --
      It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
  3. Re:Huh? by CheshireCatCO · · Score: 5, Funny

    ... in 3 million years you get a race of bipeds evolved from cats that are uber cool and fight wars over what colors their hats should be?

  4. Re:Actually... by RobertM1968 · · Score: 3, Funny

    The fundamental problem is that most people are credulous morons.

    I dunno... my studies show that only about 80% of people are credulous morons, while 50% of people are moronic intellectuals.