Joshua Allen notes that Tanenbaum — in his current incarnation as the Votemaster — does not seem to be too rigorous about statistics.
I was struck by this as well, while going through the Votemaster FAQ, where he accepts the statistically questionable Lancet study without question: Over 100,000 Iraqi civilians have died in the war, mostly women and children, he says.
Of course, given that he is a declared partisan in this contest, it is likely that Tanenbaum abandoned academic rigour for more effective rhetoric. However it also underlines why academic enquiry and politics don’t mix; to do either effectively, putting on one hat requires putting down the other.
Heh. War statistics are never accurate. You’re probably aware that more Russians and Chinese were killed than Jews, but still WW2 brings up images only of the holocaust. The worst part is, people buy these things.
Indeed. Actually by one estimation India had one of the highest body counts in WW2, ahead of Japan.
But these WW2 numbers were the result of a lot of research, unlike the half-baked Lancet study.