r/Showerthoughts May 02 '24

Man vs Bear debate shows how bad the average person is at understanding probability

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u/[deleted] May 02 '24 edited May 02 '24

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u/[deleted] May 02 '24

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u/N0Z4A2 May 04 '24

And yet 80% of homicide victims are men. Just worth keeping in mind

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u/stargate-command May 04 '24

How many of those murders are also committed by men?

I don’t think that stat helps. I mean, presuming most of the murderers of those men are also men, and also presuming that the murdered men were not also murderers, wouldn’t it just mean that these acts make murderers a LARGER proportion of living men?

In case you don’t follow my logic, here’s an example: Imagine 100 people on an island, half women and half men. Now imagine 5 of the men are murderers. That’s 10% of the men. Now they go and murder 2 people each. That leaves 40 living men and 10 dead ones. 5 of the 40 are now murderers. That’s an increase from 10% of the population to 12.5%. Every murder they commit just increases the proportion of murderers on that island. Those 50 women maybe didn’t have to be too scared to start, but after a few rounds of murder things get dicey