Gary Ackerman @garyackerman@qoto.org

One of the most chilling lines I’ve read all week: “Big Data firms have a powerful incentive to pretend that anonymization works.” #data #digitalliteracy #DataDriven #DataScience #ethics

“What questions am I allowed to ask?” Is an important (and chilling) one to answer.

Do you want to live in a world in which you cannot change your mind?

It you have an idea, but it cannot be tested? I will reject it.

When ignorant people speak, I often smile because I think they are sarcastic... then comes that terrible realization they are being serious.

Just realize when you ask that busy person to take on your great idea that you don’t know how to do... they are already working on their own ideas... which are probably better than yours.

In the Internet- dominated world, “The wider conversation, a precondition for a healthy intellectual culture, isn’t getting through.”

Fallibilism (the realization one can be wrong) is the guiding principle of free, open, liberal, secular societies.

A need for certainty makes one a weak leader.

Sir Richard Southwood said, "Remember, perhaps 50% of the facts that you learn may be not be quite right, or even wrong! It is your job to find out where new ideas are needed.” #education

Seek simplicity, and distrust it. - Alfred North Whitehead

“Ad hoc generalizations” typically clustered around the conclusion “I was right.”

Data with no theory is not worth our attention.

Data provided in full view of authority is dubious.

Self-reported data is OK, but triangulate it so it can be appropriately interpreted.

Correlation is not causation. Just a reminder.

Scientific theories are not arbitrary. They reflect reality of nature and human interaction with nature. #science

You can use all the quantitative data you can get, but you still have to distrust it and use your own intelligence and judgment. -Alvin Toffler

One of the definitions of sanity is the ability to tell real from unreal. Soon we'll need a new definition. -Alvin Toffler

#science is not about collecting facts... it is about explaining how nature works.