Government statistics used to train police officers and judges are derived significantly from surveys, as discussed in the previous post.

These surveys are represented as “science” but are in fact simply acts of collecting responses, responses that may be completely anecdotal (that is, unverified and most likely unverifiable). Interviewers ask questions, and volunteers answer. Some studies according to which policy is determined (for example, on college campuses) may not even be conducted person-to-person; they may be electronic.

Policy that indelibly impacts lives on a grand scale may be based, yes, on glorified questionnaires.

“Science” that influences research trends and legislation, and that consequently conditions police and judicial impulses, is derived by “randomly” eliciting responses from a sample population—and not a particularly large one at that.

When you hear a controversial statistic, the kind that appears in international headlines and in feminist blogs from one end of the Internet to the other, like one in five college women has been a victim of sexual assault (a statistic drawn from a Web survey administered at two American universities), that figure was based on survey data.

What is a petition?

It’s a survey (of personal experience and public sentiment).

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