On Correlation (1950-1974)

"Another thing to watch out for is a conclusion in which a correlation has been inferred to continue beyond the data with which it has been demonstrated." (Darell Huff, "How to Lie with Statistics", 1954)

"Keep in mind that a correlation may be real and based on real cause and effect, and still be almost worthless in determining action in any single case." (Darell Huff, "How to Lie with Statistics", 1954)

"When you find somebody - usually an interested party - making a fuss about a correlation, look first of all to see if it is not one of this type, produced by the stream of events, the trend of the times." (Darell Huff, "How to Lie with Statistics", 1954)

"There is no correlation between the cause and the effect. The events reveal only an aleatory determination, connected not so much with the imperfection of our knowledge as with the structure of the human world." (Raymond Aron, "The Opium of the Intellectuals", 1955)

"Correlation is an analysis of the covariation between two or more variables." (Alva M Tuttle, "Elementary Business and Economic Statistics", 1957)

"The well-known virtue of the experimental method is that it brings situational variables under tight control. It thus permits rigorous tests of hypotheses and confidential statements about causation. The correlational method, for its part, can study what man has not learned to control. Nature has been experimenting since the beginning of time, with a boldness and complexity far beyond the resources of science. The correlator’s mission is to observe and organize the data of nature’s experiments." (Lee J Cronbach, "The Two Disciplines of Scientific Psychology", The American Psychologist Vol. 12, 1957)

"It has been said that data collection is like garbage collection: before you collect it you should have in mind what you are going to do with it." (Russell Fox & Max Gorbuny, "The Science of Science: Methods of Interpreting Physical Phenomena", 1964)

"Today we preach that science is not science unless it is quantitative. We substitute correlation for causal studies, and physical equations for organic reasoning. Measurements and equations are supposed to sharpen thinking, but [...] they more often tend to make the thinking non-causal and fuzzy." (John R Platt, "Strong Inference", Science Vol. 146 (3641), 1964)

"A long-range correlation between observables has the interesting property that the equation of motion which governs the propagation of this effect is precisely the equation of motion of a freely moving particle." (Henry P Stapp, "S-Matrix Interpretation of Quantum Theory", 1970)

"Induction is the process of eliciting general laws via observation and the correlation of particular instances. All sciences, including mathematics, make use of the induction method. Now, mathematical induction is applied only by mathematicians in the proof of theorems of a particular kind." (Yakov Khurgin, "Did You Say Mathematics?", 1974)