A sneak peek of my new book Proof

An A-to-Z of the science of certainty

My new book Proof: The Uncertain Science of Certainty is out in the UK tomorrow! For those of you debating whether it’s worth picking up a copy – or the many of you who have kindly already pre-ordered and want a sneak preview – here’s an A-to-Z of some of the topics it covers:

🚀 Apollo 12, and what happened when it got struck twice by lightning.
🍺 Beer, and what it tells us about pragmatic use of statistics.
🕵️‍♂️ CIA reports, and why ‘serious possibility’ can be such a dangerous phrase.
🦆 Duck ponds, and how they created a clash between science and monarchy.
🌋 Eyjafjallajökull volcano, and what it tells us about proof under pressure.
🔬 Forensic evidence, and why it’s involved in so many incorrect convictions.
🎭 Gatecrashing, and what a little-known hoax reveals about the ecosystem of false information.
🌡️ Hot models. No, not that kind. How climate science ended up with a misinterpreted baseline scenario.
🐼 Image recognition, and how a panda threw the judgement of AI.
⚖️ Juries, and how early jurors took investigators into their own hands.
🪙 Kilograms, and the problems with a small piece of metal in France.
💰 London inter-bank lending, and how consensus can be manipulated.
📉 Mathematical ‘monsters’, and the paradoxes that shook the field of calculus.
🍼 Nutrition, and how analysis of babies’ diets transformed epidemiology.
📚 Orwell, and what links his US book royalties and the ethics of clinical trials.
🐦 Pigeons, and how they solved a mathematical puzzle that stumped a leading probability specialist.
🎰 Quebec, and what it tells us about the allure of probability in justice.
🤖 Robot racing cars, and what caused one to drive immediately into a wall.
🎯 Stolen serial numbers, and how – with some statistical innovation – they helped the Allies succeed on D-Day.
🚋 Trolley problems, and why they’re not actually that useful for understanding AI.
🏺 Ur-Nammu, and how this oldest known legal code punished false testimony.
🎲 Vietnam, and what the draft lottery can tell us about cause-and-effect.
🦸‍♀️ Wonder Woman, and how her creator shaped the role of science in the US legal system.
⚡ X-rays, and how to avoid human bias in clinical trials.
🪨 Yap, and the Micronesian stone currency that challenged western ideas about money.
🔐 Zero knowledge proofs, and how you can show someone you’ve solved a problem without revealing the solution.

If you’re interested, I also had an article in the Guardian this week on the dual risks of believing falsehoods and ignoring truth.