HOW EXTRAORDINARY

PEOPLE USED DATA

TO MAKE HISTORY
It feels like every headline, industry, “THE AGE OF BIG DATA”
NEW YORK TIMES, 2012
and thought leader is talking about data.

“BIG DATA GETS PHYSICAL”

THE GUARDIAN, 2014

“WHY THE ONLY THING BETTER

THAN BIG DATA IS BIGGER DATA”
QUARTZ, 2014

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We’re creating more
of it than ever It’s cheaper than
ever to store We can process
OVER THE LAST TWO
YEARS WE CREATED it faster than ever
TO STORE 1GB OF

90% $.05 250X

OF THE WORLD’S DATA
(SINTEF, MAY 2013)
DATA TODAY COSTS COMPUTERS TODAY ARE

VS $11.00 IN 2000 FASTER THAN IN 2000

(MOORE’S LAW)

DATA IS THE HOT

NEW THING, RIGHT? 3
WRONG
Humans have always been obsessed
with making sense of the world.
Over thousands of years we’ve been
greedily accumulating knowledge...
2,500 years ago Socrates advocated
the use of data gathering and testing
one’s assumptions. In the 16th century
Francis Bacon argued for the necessity
of studying the world empirically.

For centuries,
people used data to...
OVERTURN THE STATUS QUO
“ BY DENYING SCIENTIFIC
PRINCIPLES, ONE MAY
MAINTAIN ANY PARADOX.”
At a time in history when a person could be killed or
imprisoned for holding ideas contrary to the status quo,
Galileo championed the idea that the earth is not the
center of the cosmos.

When convicted of heresy by the Roman Inquisition and

facing the threat of death, he begrudgingly recanted.
He spent the rest of his life under house arrest quietly
GALILEO GALILEI continuing work on his scientific endeavors.

ASTRONOMER • PHYSICIST • PHILOSOPHER

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ADVANCE THE HUMAN CONDITION
“ HOW VERY LITTLE CAN BE DONE
UNDER THE SPIRIT OF FEAR.”
Florence Nightingale is best known for her role in
reforming nursing practices, but it was her work
on statistics and cutting-edge data visualization
techniques that did the most to advance
the human condition.

Her extensive research on sanitation in military

hospitals helped to reduce the hospital mortality
rate from 52% to 20%.

FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE

NURSE • STATISTICIAN • SOCIAL REFORMER

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UNDERSTAND THE UNIVERSE
“ IF YOU CAN’T EXPLAIN IT SIMPLY
YOU DON’T KNOW IT WELL ENOUGH.”
Einstein developed the world’s most famous
equation, the law of the photoelectric effect,
and the theory of relativity. All are pillars
of modern physics.

His relentless curiosity about how the

universe works fueled new ideas throughout
modern culture.

ALBERT EINSTEIN

PHYSICIST • PHILOSOPHER • WRITER

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These brilliant minds made decisions
and took actions based on evidence,
experience, and data.
The results speak for themselves.

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NOW, THINK ABOUT THIS:
Galileo had a feather & ink.
You have a supercomputer.
Old Tools vs
New Tools

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STANDING ON THE
SHOULDERS OF GIANTS
Because of Egyptian mathematics, the scientific revolution,
statistics, and every great thinker and scientist and curious
mind that has come before you, it is easier than ever for
you to also make history with data.

This is what makes data so exciting today.

Not because it’s big or new, but because
it is more accessible to more people
than ever.

With today’s tools,

anyone can be a data hero.

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HOW TO USE DATA TO
CHANGE THE WORLD
Data heroes possess a different skill set. They see 4. EXPERIMENT
the world differently. They approach problems in a DESIGN
way that most people don’t. Want to make history
with data? It’s time to learn a few fundamentals.

6. TOOLS
1. CREATIVITY
3. DATA
COLLECTION

2. INTELLECTUAL
HONESTY
5. DATA
INTERPRETATION

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HARNESS CREATIVITY
Data can help you find the
answer, but it’s up to you
to ask interesting questions.
When George Washington Carver saw soil
stripped of nutrients, he invented crop rotation.
When his strategies resulted in an overabundance
of peanuts, he discovered 300 uses for the crop.

Agriculture is as old as civilization itself, but

Carver saw conventional wisdom as something
to be improved upon, not settled for. His creative
farming practices helped build healthier, more
prosperous lives for millions of farmers. GEORGE WASHINGTON CARVER

BOTANIST • EDUCATOR • INVENTOR

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PURSUE INTELLECTUAL HONESTY
Data or no data, sometimes
you’ll still get things wrong.
And that’s ok.
Newton is revered as a key member in the
scientific revolution. He gave us calculus,
formulated the first laws of motion, and
proved the heliocentric model of the
universe once and for all.

He also wasted years of his life studying

alchemy and the occult. Sure, he got some
things wrong—you will too—but he always
remained 100% committed to pursuing the truth.

ISAAC NEWTON

PHYSICIST • MATHEMATICIAN
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COLLECT DATA SYSTEMATICALLY
You can only analyze the data you
have. Be strategic about what to
gather and how to store it.
Marie Curie discovered polonium and radium,
established the first military x-ray centers during
World War I, and led the world’s first studies on
using radioactive isotopes to treat abnormal
tissue masses known as neoplasms.

Curie died of aplastic anemia, a blood disease

caused by exposure to radiation. The data she
collected lead to her untimely death, but it
saved the lives of millions. MARIE CURIE

PHYSICIST • CHEMIST

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DESIGN EXPERIMENTS
There is an approach that leads
to the right answer: it’s called
the scientific method.
With colonial powers sailing the seas, a cure for
scurvy was a hot topic in the mid-18th century.
James Lind was the first to apply a scientific
approach to the solution.

He studied prior research of scurvy and conducted

a rudimentary A/B test—one group of sailors got
citrus, one group didn’t. It wasn’t perfect, but it
was the first clinical trial ever recorded.
JAMES LIND

ROYAL NAVY PHYSICIAN

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DECODE THE DATA
Data can be used to lead or mislead.
The difference is in the rigorous
application of statistics.
The history of mathematics is riddled with
people who misunderstood and misused data.
Numbers are tricky business.

Ronald Fisher helped us understand variance,

maximum likelihood, and sampling distribution.
Because of his contributions, anyone can make
better decisions with their data.

RONALD FISHER

STATISTICIAN

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MASTER THE TOOLS
All the processing power and
storage in the world is useless
if you don’t know how to use it.
Every web site, smartphone, and computer owes
its genesis to Alan Turing. He was the first person to
imagine the universal computer, a machine able to
accomplish any information-processing task.

Before Turing, “computers” were humans trained to do

tedious calculations by hand. Sixty years later his new
vision of the computer ushered us into
the information age.

ALAN TURING

MATHEMATICIAN • COMPUTER SCIENTIST

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DATA WON’T CHANGE THE WORLD ‘CAUSE
IT’S BIG, NEW, OR MINEABLE.
IT NEEDS
YOU
TO PUT IT
INTO ACTION.
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THE QUESTION IS...
WHICH PATH WILL YOU CHOOSE?

THE EASY WAY THE HARD WAY

Rely on authority to tell you what to do. Imagine new possibilities, test
Assume you know the answers. Keep your assumptions. Learn to
doing what you’ve always done. use data like a scientist.

Define a question

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 Gather resources
Try Googling it
MORE OF THE SAME
CRAPPY RESULTS
It’s ok, billions of people before you
have made this decision. Feel free to
continue accepting mediocre results. Form a hypothesis

Ask what your

boss thinks. OR Conduct an experiment
that can be reproduced

RESULTS THAT CAN

CHANGE THE WORLD Analyze the data
Are you sure? Remember,
they wanted to kill Galileo. Draw conclusions

Publish & learn

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THE CHALLENGE IS THIS:
Using data is hard. It takes more time,
new skills, and a different way of
thinking. It also takes courage —
no one likes being told they’re wrong.

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LET’S FACE IT, NOBODY EVER SAID
DOING GREAT THINGS WAS EASY

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WHY WE
WROTE THIS
When people think critically, test their
assumptions, and know how to interpret
data they consistently get better results.
The world needs better results.

We need better results in our schools, from

our businesses, and for our cities. We need more
people to think like Florence Nightingale,
James Lind, and George Washington Carver.
We need more people who choose the hard way.

Go forth and analyze.